Tentacles of Love and Loss
by InfinityStar
Summary: A routine investigation uncovers a shocking surprise for Goren, sending him digging into the past for answers.
1. A Puzzle From the ME

**_The family - that dear octopus from whose tentacles we never quite escape, nor, in our inmost hearts, ever quite wish to. _**_**~Dodie Smith**_

* * *

><p>Robert Goren set the phone back on its cradle, his brow furrowed. Eames looked up at him as he shuffled his paperwork together and slipped it into his desk drawer. "Uhm, Rodgers needs to see us," he told her as he closed the drawer.<p>

"Why? We haven't caught another case yet."

"She wouldn't say."

Eames put her own papers away. "Then let's go see what she wants."

Things had changed between the partners since the death of Goren's mother a few months earlier. Goren seemed to be skirting an invisible line between propriety and disaster, and Eames was much more patient with him than usual, willing to put up with his erratic behavior to the point of covering for him when he crossed the line.

They exited the elevator at the morgue. The mixture of odors that first assaulted them when they got off the elevator always made Eames' stomach lurch a little, but Goren was unaffected. While she breathed in a soup of odors, he mentally broke the air down into its individual components—disinfectant, soap, formalin, decay.

They tracked down the medical examiner, surprised to find both Logan and Wheeler with her. They looked distinctly uncomfortable. The body of a young woman was laid out on the slab before them. Goren's eyes gave the room a quick scan—he nodded at Logan and Wheeler—before they settled on the body of the young woman. As usual, Eames spoke first. "You wanted to see us?"

Rodgers had not specifically requested Eames, but she was glad to see her. Not surprised, but very glad. This was going to be difficult. The ME watched Goren as he studied the young woman. _He can't help himself_, she thought with affection. "This is about you, Detective Goren."

He looked up at her, then at Logan and Wheeler. Logan was unusually subdued. With a puzzled frown, he looked back at Rodgers. "This is their case," he said.

"It involves you," Wheeler said gently.

"Me?" He looked around the room again. "Am I a suspect?"

Logan frowned. "Why would you ask that? Do you know her?"

"No, but I can't think of any other way I could be involved."

"Did we ask you for an alibi?" Logan replied lightly, obliquely dismissing the idea that Goren was a suspect.

Wheeler glared at him. The last thing Goren needed was Logan giving him a hard time, even if he wasn't serious. "You're not a suspect," she assured him. "But you need to listen to what Dr. Rodgers has to say."

Eames stepped closer to her partner, a move that didn't go unnoticed. Whether she was being protective or supportive didn't matter. He would likely need both from her. Rodgers looked at Logan and Wheeler. Wheeler took the cue and said, "We caught this case last week. The body is a Jane Doe, mid-to-late-twenties. Her body was dumped at Gracie Mansion, which is why we caught it. The mayor's wife came across her while walking their dog."

"The shock bought her a two day hospital vacation," Logan added.

Goren listened with interest, his eyes drifting from Logan and Wheeler to the body, making note of her features. Her dark hair was wavy and cut to shoulder length; it would have framed her pretty face nicely. She was tall but not too thin. Athletic—he would describe her build as athletic."What was the cause of death?"

Rodgers answered, "She was choked into unconsciousness and then drowned in a bathtub."

He nodded, noting the subtle signs left by partial asphyxiation on the lithe, young body. He leaned down, catching the last lingering scent of the bathwater that had claimed her short life, the scent of tropical fruit riding the less subtle scent of decay. "I still don't see how this involves me."

"Just wait," Logan said. "We haven't gotten to the good part yet. Doc?"

Rodgers' tone was uncharacteristically gentle. "It's not about the case, detective. It's about the victim. Her prints were not in the system, so I ran her DNA, on the off chance something would pop."

"Something popped, okay," Logan interjected, earning him another glare from his partner.

Rodgers went on. "I didn't get a match on her but I did get something else: a strong partial match."

Goren had no trouble following her. He cocked his head to the side, his expression a mixture of interest and confusion. "A partial match...to me?"

The ME took a folder from the counter behind her and held it out to him. He knew how to interpret the data. Everyone in the room watched him study the DNA evidence as Rodgers said, "When this hit came back, I specifically ran her DNA against yours in the system, to see if I could find out why you popped against her genetics. Detective, this woman has enough DNA in common with you to be a sibling or a child of yours."

Goren studied the report until the pages started to blur. He looked at Rodgers, his expression reflecting his bafflement. He was stunned. He met the M.E.'s eyes. "Is...Is mine the only DNA that was flagged?"

She nodded. "Yes," she answered, not surprised by the question.

He looked back down at the body, his expression now more than one of casual interest and curiosity. "I-I don't have a child, an-and my only sibling...is my brother."

"Would his DNA be in the system?" Wheeler asked.

Goren shrugged. "I don't know."

"It can't be, if he wasn't flagged as well," Eames insisted.

Rodgers was shaking her head. "I looked. Frank Goren's prints are in the system but not his DNA."

"Unless this is a kid you never knew you had," Logan suggested, earning him another harsh look from his partner as well as one from Eames.

"Or...Or something else," Goren muttered, distracted. "H-How old is she again?"

"Mid-to-late-twenties," Rogers answered.

Goren began to circle the table, talking more to himself than to the others in the room as he tried to work out the details in his mind. "So...She would have been born...between 1978 and 1983...I went into the army in 1980...and I was away...until, uh, 1992." He shook his head slowly, mentally running down the list of women he slept with during that time. "No. She's not my child."

"Are you sure?" Logan pressed.

Still looking at the body of the young woman to whom he was somehow related, he nodded. "I'm positive. If I'd gotten anyone pregnant during that time...well, none of them would have kept it a secret."

"So that means...she was your sister..." Wheeler said haltingly, watching him carefully as she spoke.

He looked at Rodgers, who barely moved her head from side to side in response to an unasked question. "You...You're sure?" he asked her.

Rodgers gently said, "I knew you would ask, and I checked just to be sure. Then I ran yours three times before I called Logan and Wheeler. It's not wrong."

His eyes shifted to Logan and Wheeler. Wheeler said, "I told her you had to be told."

Goren nodded. "Thank-Thank you, Wheeler." He closed the folder and looked back at Rodgers. "Uh, can I..."

Rodgers nodded. "I made that copy for you."

"Thank you. I...I'll look into it." He was beginning to sweat as the walls seemed to close in on him. Starting for the exit, he stopped when he got to the door and turned. "Thank you," he repeated, his eyes once more resting on the pretty young woman whose life had been brutally stolen from her.

Eames looked around the room, obviously in full protective mode. Although he had joked a little, trying to lighten the mood in the room, Logan understood the grave implications of what had just happened. Goren was his friend and he would protect him as fiercely as Eames did. He raised his hand. "It doesn't leave this room, Eames. Promise."

The two women agreed with him and Eames hurried after her partner.

Wheeler was the first to speak. "He took that better than I thought he would."

Logan shook his head slowly. "You think so? I don't."

"What makes you say that?" Wheeler asked.

"Four years ago, we kind of worked a case together. He saved my life, and that's not something I take lightly. We started hanging out together after that. He plays his reactions very close to the vest. Trust me, Wheeler. He didn't take that well at all." He started for the door. "Thanks, Rodgers."

Rodgers let out a soft sigh. She agreed with Logan. The news hit Goren much harder than he let on. She drew a sheet over the young woman, reassuring herself that Logan and Eames would take care of Goren. She wheeled the unclaimed body to the cooler. Something told her it wouldn't go unclaimed much longer. This Jane Doe would be buried with dignity and a name.


	2. Brainstorming

**A/N: Okay, my bad. Originally, I had this story set between Endgame and Untethered, around the time of Self-Made. Unfortunately, I forgot Wheeler was in Europe at that time and Logan was partnered with Falacci. So, what to do. Here is my dilemma: I wanted the story set before Untethered because afterward, Bobby was estranged from Frank. I can't put it in Season 6 because I need the MFB angle established in Endgame. I can't put it in Season 8 because I need Frank alive. I don't want to use Falacci for this because I wanted a sensitive person in the opening chapter. Wheeler is sensitive; Falacci is not. I just can't see Falacci being as empathetic as Wheeler was in the morgue scene. So, I am going to invoke my writer's prerogative and delay Wheeler's departure for Europe until after this case. That little tweak is a lot easier than re-writing that scene with Falacci. She may be a mother, but that woman does not do warm and fuzzy. Goren certainly didn't need her to stand there accusing him of abandoning his pregnant girlfriend or knowingly denying his child's paternity. Eames and Logan would never have stood for that, and...there might have been bloodshed. That would have been so messy. So, dear readers, with that caveat, we shall move onward!**

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><p>Eames caught up to Goren as the elevator opened, and she followed him into the car. He opened the file and stared at the report inside, hoping to discourage conversation. Eames recognized the tactic and she respected it, remaining silent but moving closer to him when the elevator stopped on the first floor. Two civilian staff members and a uniformed patrolman stepped into the car. As they ascended to the eleventh floor, people came and went, and the two detectives were not alone in the elevator again.<p>

When they stepped out on the eleventh floor, Eames followed her partner to their desks. He shifted restlessly in front of his desk. "Bobby..." she began.

He shook his head, cutting her off. "Not now, Eames."

She watched him gather his things before he looked at her and said, "I..have some thinking to do. I'll call you later."

"Bobby..."

"Later," he insisted. "I promise."

She watched him leave, uncertain. She wanted to go with him, but he obviously wanted to be alone. She wasn't sure how healthy that was, leaving him alone when he was clearly distressed. He'd floundered after his mother's death until Kevin Quinn was murdered and he had a case to divert his attention from his grief. She sighed softly and wondered if their current caseload was convoluted enough to engage him in the face of the news he had just received.

Opening her laptop, she began to search the birth records for the state of New York. She narrowed down her search with a couple of criteria. Date of birth: 1978 – 1983. Gender: female. Father: William Goren. Nothing. So she broadened her search to surrounding states and she went on from there.

* * *

><p>Goren decided against driving home. He was too distracted to drive safely. Besides, walking always helped him to clear his mind. He left the headquarters building, headed north and kept walking. His mind spun in multiple directions as he tried to figure out how that girl in the morgue could be related to him. He would have questioned the DNA results if anyone but Rodgers had run them, and since she'd run the samples more than once, he had to accept the results as accurate. He could not, however, wrap his mind around the implications. What the hell could it mean? What sort of obligation did it place on him?<p>

When he became aware of his surroundings again, it was getting dark. He walked to the nearest intersection. 6th Avenue and Waverly Place. Greenwich Village. His head was aching. He found the closest bar and went inside.

He was working on his second drink when his phone vibrated against his thigh in his pocket. Pulling it out, he looked at the caller ID. _Logan_. Flipping it open, he answered, "Goren."

"It's about damn time. Where are you?"

"What do you mean, it's about damn time?"

"I've been calling you all afternoon."

"Oh. I...uh, why?"

"Why have I been calling? I'm worried about you, and so is your partner. You promised her you'd call later. Well, it's later and she hasn't heard from you."

"It's not later enough."

"Okay, whatever. Back to my first question. Where are you?"

"In the Village."

"Can you be a little more specific? I'm not going to drive all over the Village yelling your name out the damn window."

"You would, too, wouldn't you?"

"Damn right I would."

"Hold on."

He motioned to the bartender and asked for the address of the place, which he relayed to Logan. "Happy?"

"Oh, yeah. Ecstatic. I'll see you in twenty."

Goren closed his phone and checked his alerts. Nine missed calls. Five from Logan and four from Eames. _Great_. Slipping the phone into his pocket, he motioned for another drink.

* * *

><p>Logan arrived as promised, but he wasn't alone. He slid onto the stool at Goren's right, and Eames slid onto the stool at his left, after she nudged him hard with her shoulder. "Thanks for the call."<p>

"I was gonna call you."

"Middle-of-the-night, drunken, can-you-come-get-me calls don't count. I thought you learned that lesson already."

"You always come to get me"

"Yes, and then you pass out in my car and I have to take you to my place and park you on the couch."

"You don't have to."

"The hell I don't. The distance from my car to my couch is a fraction of the distance from wherever I can find a place to park to your place. You don't have a driveway, remember? And just so you know, I do _not_ appreciate you ignoring my calls. _That_ lesson you never seem to learn."

She ordered a vodka martini and Logan ordered a scotch. Eames leaned back, looking at Logan behind Goren's back. When he didn't look at her, she threw a peanut at him. "Hey," he protested.

She glared at him and he let out an exaggerated sigh. Pulling out his car keys, he tossed them to her. "Happy, mother?"

"I learn _my_ lessons," she shot back. "The last time I was out with the two of you, we damn near got arrested, and you clowns did not help that situation at all. That is _not_ going to happen a second time."

"Suppose I promise to be good?"

"Do you even know how to be good, Logan?"

He shrugged, picking up his drink from the bar and taking a sip. "I tried it. It's overrated."

Eames shook her head and took a drink of her martini. She returned her attention to her partner. "So what's going on?" she said sympathetically.

"Nothing much. I spent the afternoon walking and thinking. You know how I get lost in my head sometimes. I honestly didn't mean to ignore your calls."

"Have you come to terms with anything?"

"No."

She nodded slowly. "Okay, then...let's take this party home and see if we can help you sort through this."

"Eames..."

"It's Friday night. Logan can crash on your couch and I'll take a cab home, if I have to. If you argue with me, I'll stick to you like glue until you talk to me. So unless you really do want to be joined at the hip, you'll accept my offer."

Logan nudged him. "Who can refuse a threat, I mean offer, like that."

Eames glared at him and he laughed. Even Goren smiled. They finished their drinks and left the bar.

* * *

><p>An hour later, they were gathered in Goren's living room. They'd ordered pizza and raided the beer in the fridge. "While you were out wandering, I did some checking," Eames said. "I searched the birth records for a female child born between 1978 and 1983 to William Goren, and I came up empty in the state of New York. I remember you saying something about your mom complaining he was often gone, so I expanded the search to include New Jersey, Connecticut and Pennsylvania. Again, nothing. So then I gave the time frame plus-or-minus two years. Apparently, even though he was a longtime player, William Goren was a very careful man, at least he was between 1976 and 1985. Just for kicks, I repeated the same search with your name, even though you were in Germany. You'll be happy to know that also turned up no results. Then I ran it with Frank as the father. Again, nothing. After that, I ran out of parameters. Could you have fathered a child in Germany?"<p>

"Anything is possible, I suppose, but...you know me, Eames. I-I'm careful. I guess you could say I sowed my fair share of wild oats, but I was still careful. I-I guess I can look up my old girlfriends, just in case, but like I said...the women I was with during that time...they would have welcomed a legitimate opportunity to stay, uh, connected to me."

She knew he spoke the truth. Goren rarely left anything to chance and she trusted that he was consistent with his use of protection during sex. "So what do you suggest?"

He was quiet for a long time, pondering his answer as he calculated the reaction Eames and Logan might have to the truth he was trying to keep hidden. Finally, he said, "I'm afraid you wasted your afternoon. If-If the man I called my father had another child with any woman other than my mother...I...I wouldn't have any genetic relationship with that child."

"What are you talking about?"

He stared at the folder resting in his binder. "I, uhm, I recently found out...he, he was not...not my biological father."

Logan looked interested. "No kidding? Do you know who your father is?"

"Yeah, I know." He got up from the easy chair in the corner and walked to his desk. "My mother had an affair early in her marriage to my father. It lasted until I was about four, according to my brother. She told me she never knew which man fathered me." He pulled an envelope from his desk drawer and turned it over in his hands. Once the envelope left his hands, there would be no taking it back. Whatever was changed by the information within it would be changed forever. He held out the envelope without looking at either of them.

Logan and Eames exchanged a look before Logan got up and took the envelope. He hesitated, seeing how reluctant Goren was to share whatever information it held. "Go ahead," Goren said. "Look at it."

One way or another, he would find out what kind of friends he had in the two people in his living room. Now that his mother was gone, Eames and Logan were about the only people left in the world about whom he truly cared. He closed his eyes, waiting for the storm that was sure to come.

Slowly, Logan opened the envelope and slid out the single folded piece of paper it held. He unfolded it and read the report. He had difficulty hiding his reaction before he handed it off to Eames.

She unfolded the paper, recognizing the form as one from the medical examiner's lab, a DNA test, like the one he had in his binder from the Jane Doe. She looked at her partner one more time before she read on.

Subject # 1: Goren, Robert O.

Subject # 2: Brady, Mark F.

Genetic probability for paternity: 99.7%

She stared at the paper, uncomprehending. _Genetic probability for paternity: 99.7%._ She read that line over and over. Then she looked at Goren. She opened her mouth, but no words came out, so she closed it. She continued to look at him until she found a couple of words. "Mark Ford Brady? Mark Ford Brady is your...your..."

He nodded. "My father. He was on leave, uh, in-in November of 1960, when I...when I would have been conceived. I started to put the pieces together after I saw this." He withdrew something else from the same drawer, a picture, which he handed to Logan, who passed it on to Eames. She recognized it as one of Brady's pictures, only it hadn't been damaged by the elements. "Th-That's my mother. I-I confronted her about it, right before she died. As you know, sometimes my timing really sucks. Since she didn't know which man was my father, I-I had to know, so I asked Rodgers if she would do the test. She didn't want to, but she did it...as a favor to me. Brady...He wasn't trying to clear his conscience before he died, even if he was trying to extend his sentence by sending us on a chase for those scrapbooks he hid. But I think he'd already made peace with his fate. He-He wanted to...to do one last thing before he died. He wanted to make some kind of connection with his son, with me...to send me a message so that I would know the role he played in my life."

Eames sat heavily, looking back and forth between the photo and the paternity test results. It was almost too much to take in...almost. _I had to know._ Of course he did. He always had to know. He was not a man who could ever just leave well enough alone. He could not leave questions unanswered. Finally, she placed the photo with the test results and set both on the coffee table. Then she looked up at him. "It doesn't mean anything, Bobby."

Logan nodded in agreement. "She's right. It doesn't matter."

He stared at them. "Doesn't mean anything? It means I'm the son of a serial killer and rapist, Eames." His eyes darted to Logan. "How does that not matter?"

"Come on, Bobby," Logan said reasonably. "Finding out who your father really is forty-five years after the fact doesn't change who you are."

"Exactly," Eames agreed. "You can't beat yourself up over something you had nothing to do with. We don't choose our parents. This doesn't do anything to change the man you are, and it certainly doesn't change the way I feel about you. It's nothing. You became the good man you are despite your upbringing—and your paternity—so don't go off the deep end over this."

"Don't you think this explains how I can get into their heads so well?"

"Maybe it does and maybe it doesn't. We'll never know. Maybe it also explains why you're not a junkie and a gambler like your brother. Like Mike said, it doesn't matter. Whatever it took to make you the man you are is fine by me."

That was definitely not the reaction he'd expected. He'd been looking for anger and revulsion, the kind of reaction he'd had, not acceptance. He had no idea what to say, so he just stood there and stared at them before he returned to his chair and sat down.

She picked up the test results and the photo and handed them to Logan, who slid them back into the drawer Goren had gotten them from. She picked up her beer and took a drink. "So tomorrow I'll take a look and see if Brady is listed as the father in any of the birth records during that time. Of course, that doesn't rule him out. I don't know many women who would list their rapist as the father of their child, if they even knew he was."

She succeeded in refocusing him and he snapped out of his funk. "I...I, uhm, it's possible, but...this woman is not his daughter. He would have popped on the DNA comparison if she was. Rodgers...uh, she already thought of that."

"Rodgers is good that way," Logan admitted.

"How long did you say the affair lasted?" Eames asked.

"It ended in 1965, when I was four, after he..." He almost choked on the word. "Uh, after he...raped and beat her. Frank and I were told it was a car accident. They, uhm, my grandparents, that is, they closed ranks around her when it happened."

"Okay, so then, what do you want to do?"

He rubbed his eyes. "I want to go to bed so I can wake up from this nightmare."

Logan sat on the couch at the end opposite Eames and tossed out the scenario no one had brought up though they were all thinking it. "So if she isn't Brady's daughter, and you're sure you didn't father a child..."

Goren waved his hand, silencing him. He didn't want to think about it, but he had no choice—and they were thinking along the same lines he was. He shook his head. "Someone would have contacted me," he muttered, desperately wanting to believe what he said.

"Are you sure about that?" Eames asked.

He closed his eyes and ran a hand through his hair. Finally, he shook his head. "No. I'm not. But...why wouldn't she want me to know?"

Silence filled the room following his question. Eames finally responded, "You were just starting your life, Bobby. Maybe she didn't want to interfere with that."

"Or maybe she didn't want me to interfere with her decision."

"Would your brother know?" Logan asked.

"Maybe. I'll have to call him and find out what he knew. He was supposed to be watching out for her while I was gone. That was why I had to get out of the army and come home, because he did such a bang-up job of it. If she had taken her medicine for the twelve years I was gone, maybe I wouldn't have had to come home, maybe I wouldn't have had to put her in Carmel Ridge."

"There's no way to know, is there?" she quietly asked.

"No. The disease progresses differently for different people. Some respond to medication, some don't. Some do better over time, some never do, even with meds. But the longer the disease goes without proper treatment, the more severe it tends to be later on. I think that was what happened with my mother. If she had a child...after she was diagnosed...it could have made things a lot worse."

"Have you ever donated sperm?" Logan asked.

"What?"

Eames nodded, following Logan's suggestion. "If you donated sperm, then she could be your biological child."

"And the father would be listed as Donor # 58903," Logan added.

Goren rubbed the back of his neck. "No. I never donated sperm. I didn't want the specter of that hanging over my head."

"The specter of what? I think your children would be adorable," she asserted, glaring at Logan when he laughed.

"The specter of unknowingly fathering a child, of possibly passing on schizophrenia to an unsuspecting family. I would never do that. They would be adorable ticking time bombs."

His response did not surprise her. "Then call Frank," she said. "Find out if he knows what happened. Bobby, that girl came from somewhere, and somehow, she is related to you."

He remained where he was for a few minutes, his hand clamped against his neck. Finally, he stood, walked to the counter and picked up his cell phone.


	3. Information From His Brother

Goren knew, from the way his brother spoke over the phone, that Frank was high, and he felt his gut clench. Eames sensed his tension and reached out to him, touching his arm. This was important, more important than berating Frank for his addictions. "Frank, I have to talk to you."

"Okay, so talk."

"Not over the phone. Face to face."

"When?"

"Now."

"Really, Bobby, this isn't the best time..."

"I know you're high. That doesn't matter. This has to do...with a case...and I need to talk to you."

"A case? How could I possibly help you with a case?"

Goren was getting impatient, pacing restlessly as Logan and Eames watched him. "We won't know until I talk to you," he growled, losing his grip on his temper.

"Okay, okay, calm down. Where do you wanna meet?"

"Meet me at the Downtown Diner, on Atlantic Avenue."

He knew that was close to Frank's apartment. "Yeah, okay, I'll see you there in, what, forty-five minutes?"

"That works."

He closed his phone and stood still for a minute. "I can't discuss this over the phone with him. I have to see his face, his reactions."

Eames nodded. "We'll go with you."

He shook his head. "I have to talk to him alone."

She shrugged. "We'll wait outside."

"Or sit someplace else inside," Logan offered, not particularly wanting to sit in the car and wait.

Goren conceded, not wanting to argue but wanting even less to be alone at the moment. "Let's go then."

A half hour later, they were seated in the diner with coffee, waiting for sandwiches. Goren, who hadn't ordered anything, watched the door. Logan and Eames knew when he spotted his brother. His hand brushed Eames' thigh as he got up, and he glanced at her. Her expression conveyed encouragement, and he smiled briefly. Looking at Logan, he saw the same expression. With a nod, he walked away from the table.

The brothers took a seat at the counter and asked for coffee. The waitress didn't bat an eye as she served Goren a second cup. He wished it was stronger than coffee. He wanted a cigarette, too. Instead, he forced himself to focus on his brother.

Frank looked at him with bloodshot eyes. "How can I help you, Bobby?"

"I have to ask you something, Frank, and I need an honest answer."

"Okay, shoot."

_Don't tempt me,_ Goren thought. "When I was in the army, you were supposed to be taking care of Mom."

"What does that have to do with your case?"

"I'm getting there."

"I told you a long time ago, I did my best. How do you take care of someone who doesn't want you to take care of her?"

"You do it any way you can, Frank." He paused to gather himself. "Look, I don't want to argue. I need some information, about Mom's health during that time."

"Aw, Bobby, I didn't keep up with that kinda stuff. I visited her and I tried to get her to take her meds. I went over when she called me, which was pretty often, you know."

"Yeah, I know. I spent the last fifteen years of her life being there for her."

"Well, she's gone now. Maybe you should get on with your life. Find a wife to take care of, a good woman who'll take care of you, too. Maybe Eames..."

Goren made an impatient gesture. "Yeah, yeah, I don't want to discuss my love life, either."

"Do you even _have_ a love life, little brother?"

He recognized Frank's attempts to direct the conversation away from their mother, and he resented it. He was getting agitated. "Mom, Frank. When I was away, did she see the doctor for anything specific?"

"You mean her shrink?"

"No, I mean a regular doctor, or any kind of specialist."

"You have access to her records, don't you? I'm sure you've been through them a hundred times."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"I just know that you're thorough, that's all."

Goren made an impatient sound. "The records I have start with her admission to Carmel Ridge. She would never give me the name of any doctor she saw before then."

"So whatever you're looking for, it's something she didn't want you to know."

"There are a lot of things she didn't want me to know, Frank, and they're all popping up to ambush me!" He realized he would have to be direct with him. "Did Mom get pregnant while I was in the army?"

Frank's silence spoke volumes. Goren rubbed the back of his neck impatiently. "Well, Frank? Did she?" he demanded loudly.

"Why...why would you even ask that?"

"Because I need to know! Dammit, Frank..."

"Okay, okay, calm down. I couldn't be with her every moment, Bobby."

Goren's agitation skyrocketed, but he realized he was being aggressively loud and he fought to control himself. He made a conciliatory gesture toward the waitress and the cook who had stepped out of the kitchen. When they went back to what they were doing, he returned his attention to Frank. "During the few moments you did spend with her, did she have a baby?"

"I resent that," Frank complained.

"You'll resent it even more if I have to drag your ass out to the street. Now answer me!"

Frank's hands shook as he raised his coffee cup to his lips and took a drink. His voice was equally shaky, barely a whisper. "Yeah, she did."

Goren's stomach did a flip, a thousand questions swirled through his mind. He took a few moments to compose himself. He really wanted a drink now. "Who was the baby's father?"

Frank paused. "It was...it was her shrink at the time."

Goren's vision faded for a moment as he saw red. "What?"

"Her shrink. Name was Rutherford. As soon as I found out, I found her another shrink, I swear."

"Where is he now?"

"He took up permanent residence in Holy Cross about twelve years ago. I know where the grave is if you want to visit."

"The baby?"

"Mom always told me it wasn't her fault. You know how that goes. It was never her fault we had no food, or the heat got turned off. It wasn't her fault you broke your arm or fell out that window. I never knew for sure what was real and what wasn't, and I don't think she knew either."

"The baby was real, Frank!"

"Yeah, she was."

"When was she born?"

"I think it was the spring of, uh, 1982, if I remember right."

Goren's temper was simmering. "And you never thought to tell me about it?"

"Mom didn't want me to tell you, Bobby. She was freaked about you finding out, so I had to swear I wouldn't tell you. Why do you think she didn't want you home for Christmas that year? She didn't want you to know about the baby. She said it would ruin your life because you'd take responsibility for the damn thing."

Propping his elbow on the counter, Goren rubbed his temple. "You should have fucking told me, Frank. What happened to the baby?"

"Mom refused to get an abortion. Said she would burn in hell for murder if she did. So she had the baby. And then she had another episode, right there in the delivery room, not ten minutes after the baby was born. She freaked out, blaming the doctors for doing some kind of experimentation on her. Since she lived alone and I couldn't be there to take care of her full time...well, they took the baby. I told her to call you but she refused. She knew you would do the right thing by the baby and that would be a slap in her face because she couldn't take care of her. That's all I know. They would never tell me what happened to her, except that she got placed right away with a good family and adopted through family court in Brooklyn. It was a closed adoption; the records are sealed. That's all I know."

Goren was suddenly exhausted. "You were there with her, when the baby was born?"

"I was. She was a tiny little thing, but boy, did she have a set of lungs."

Goren nodded slowly. "Good. At least you did that right. Thanks, Frank."

He got up from his seat and pulled out his wallet, dropping three twenties on the counter by his brother and tucking a five under his coffee cup. Frank looked up at him. "What's that for?"

"I told you it was about a case."

Frank picked up the money. "This the going rate for an informant?"

"Don't expect any more from me. I'm not paying for your habit."

"Screw you, Bobby." He turned back to his coffee, the money curled into his fist. "Wait—this is about a case?"

"Yeah. I told you Mom's surprises keep ambushing me. The baby's all grown up now and my DNA profile popped when her DNA was run through the system by the medical examiner. Thanks for the info."

He left the diner. Frank stared at the bills crumpled in his fist and never noticed Logan and Eames when they left right after his brother did.

When he left the diner ten minutes later, he left the three twenties, still crumpled together, beside his coffee cup.

Eames and Logan caught up to him before he'd gone half a block. "Well?" Logan asked.

Goren looked at him. "Weren't you listening?"

"Some of it was hard to hear and I didn't think you'd appreciate us trying to sit in your lap."

Goren stopped, running his hand through his hair, still agitated. "She...my mother...she had a baby, uh, in...in 1982. We need a court order to open a sealed adoption record in Brooklyn family court."

Logan nodded. "I'll call the DA in the morning."

Eames slid her hand onto his arm. "Are you okay?"

"I'm...uh...I don't know, Eames. I honestly don't know."

Logan clapped his hand on Goren's shoulder. "Come on, buddy. I'll buy you a drink. You look like you could use one."

They continued down the street to the bar on the corner and went inside.


	4. Unraveling

Goren sat at the bar, silently looking into the glass cradled in his hands. His emotions were spinning beyond his control but, flanked by Eames and Logan, he felt anchored. It was okay for him to feel what he was feeling, the grief, the anger, the shock. They would not judge him. Long ago, they had both earned his trust. Silent, he sat there, and they let him remain silent and lost in his thoughts.

It took several drinks before his rational mind kicked in and began working again. There were things that had to be done. He coughed, and, without looking at either of them, he said, "We have to go to Canarsie tomorrow, to the local precinct. My brother...he said the baby's father was a guy named Rutherford, my mother's psychiatrist. We need to see the file of their investigation...and the social worker's file as well from the county office."

Eames looked at Logan. After all, the case was still his and Wheeler's. "Bobby," she said gently. "You can't. You're way too close to this."

Logan placed his hand on Goren's arm. "Look, there's no need for you to deal with this in front of God and everybody. Wheeler and I will take care of all that and you can look through my casefile at the end of the day. Full disclosure, buddy. I promise."

Goren hesitated. "I, uh, I forgot... It's your case. I'm sorry."

"Don't be. I'll keep you in the loop. We'll do right by her, Bobby. You have my word."

Goren nodded. "I...thanks."

"Don't mention it."

He fell back into silence, and after two more drinks, Eames tried to lure him out. She leaned closer to him. "Hey," she said gently, nudging his arm. "What's going on in there?"

He didn't react for a moment. Then, he turned his head to look at her. The pain in his eyes struck her like a physical blow. When he spoke, Eames and Logan could both feel his grief. "A sister," he said. "I...I had a sister, and I never knew. How...How could she do that to me?"

"What did Frank tell you?" Logan asked, his voice softly encouraging. "How did it happen?"

"Her psychiatrist...He did that to her...and she didn't want to burn in hell for killing a baby, so she carried the pregnancy to term. She had a psychotic break after the birth, and they took the baby from her, adopted her out."

"Why didn't Frank call you?" Eames asked.

"She didn't want me to know, and he promised her he wouldn't tell me. Only fucking promise he ever kept in his life."

The rage built up quickly and explosively. He threw his glass at the far wall. Eames grabbed him as Logan assured the bartender they had him under control. Goren yanked his arm away from her and lurched toward the exit with Eames right behind him. Logan threw a couple of bills on the bar and ran after them.

Goren started toward his car, pulling his keys from his pocket. Eames snatched them from his hand. "Oh, no, you don't. You're in no condition to drive."

He turned on her. "How could he do that? How could he violate her trust...her...her..."

She grabbed his arms as Logan came up beside her. "Bobby...come on...get a grip!"

He pulled away from her again, more roughly than he intended, and Logan grabbed him. He threw him against a wall and held him there, pressing his forehead against Goren's. "It happens, man. The people we trust most are the ones who hurt us the worst. It happened to me when I was a kid...and he was a goddam priest. No one should ever do that, but it fucking happens, and there are _always_ innocent victims who have to pick up the pieces while the bad guy gets away. You know this, Bobby! You know this. Come on, man...pull it together."

Goren closed his eyes as Logan's voice got softer. His ragged breathing calmed and he braced his hands on Logan's shoulders. Softly, Logan repeated, "Pull it together, buddy."

Eames watched the two men, and she knew they shared something she never could, a bond forged through their common experiences at the hands of abusive parents. She had been raised in a close family by loving parents; they had survived something she could never truly understand.

Goren nodded slowly. "Thanks," he whispered.

Logan patted the side of his head. "Let's take you home. Wheeler and I will go to Canarsie first thing in the morning. We'll find whoever did this to her, and we'll find out who she was for you."

Goren nodded as Logan stepped away, and he reached out to Eames, pulling her into a hug. He kissed her head. "I'm sorry," he murmured into her hair.

Sliding her arms around his waist, she returned his hug. "You're fine, Bobby."

"No. No, I'm not."

They walked to the car and she unlocked it. "Yeah, you are. You just don't know it yet." She leaned up and gave him a brief kiss. "Get in the car."

* * *

><p>Logan pulled up outside the 69th precinct station house, and he and Wheeler got out of the car. He looked up at the brick building. "Let's go play nice with the natives, Wheeler."<p>

"Let me do the talking, Logan."

"Knock yourself out."

They went into the building and walked up to the desk. The desk sergeant, a career office who looked bored and tired, glanced at the badges clipped onto their jackets. "What can I do for you, detectives?"

"Detectives Wheeler and Logan, Major Case," Wheeler said. "We're investigating a homicide that involves a 26 year old rape case that took place in your jurisdiction. We need your files for the investigation of our case."

"26 years ago? You're kidding me, right?"

"Do we look like we're kidding?" Logan said, earning himself a glare from Wheeler.

"Files that old? They're in a warehouse waiting to be, uh, 'digitized into the database'."

"How long would it take to get a copy of the file?"

"Fill out a requisition and we'll send it to you. It'll take a week or two."

"We're working an open homicide, sergeant. We need it sooner than that."

He handed her a form. "I'll put a rush on it."

Wheeler gave him a look as she took the form, grabbed a clipboard and sat down to fill it out with the information Logan had given her about the rape of Frances Goren. While he waited, Logan looked around at the officers who came and went. The case was older than most of them were, it seemed. Most, but not all. "I'll be right back, Wheeler," he said.

He approached the desk of a plainclothes officer who looked about his age, maybe a little older. "Hey," he said to get the other officer's attention. He extended his hand. "Logan, Major Case."

The man looked up and accepted the extended hand. "Jordan," he answered. "What's Major Case doing out here in the trenches?"

Logan laughed and motioned at the chair beside the desk. "You mind?"

Jordan shook his head and motioned at the chair. "Nope. Help yourself."

Logan sat down. "Guys move around a lot. Where'd you come here from?"

"Bed-Stuy. Where were you before Major Case?"

"Staten Island. Manhattan before that. The 2-7."

"I started off here, before Bed Stuy. Then I came back. Wife wanted me in our home precinct."

"Makes sense. Were you here in the early 80s?"

"Yeah. I made detective in 1980."

"Do you remember a case, back in 81? A rape. Psychiatrist took advantage of a patient named Frances Goren."

Jordan closed his eyes. "Goren..." he repeated. "Yeah...schizophrenic, right?"

"Yeah. Her son is one of us now."

"Really? He cleaned up his act?"

Logan was puzzled for a moment. "Oh, you mean the older son. No. He never did. The younger son was a cop with the Army CID in Germany at the time. He's in Major Case with me now."

He nodded. "That's right. She kept threatening to call the army and get her son to make us stop harassing her. That woman was full of piss and vinegar. Shrink had a lot of guts, taking advantage of a spitfire like her. We tried to interview her, several times. She didn't want any part of the investigation. Nice lady."

"Yeah, well, that kinda stuff happens when they don't take their meds like they're supposed to."

"That's why we never believed her when she threatened to sic the Army on us. What brings you around looking for info on that case? It's a closed case."

"Body found by the mayor's wife, near Gracie Mansion."

"Oh, yeah. I read about that. Thought it was a Jane Doe."

"She is and she isn't. Turns out her DNA popped the profile of my buddy, Mrs. Goren's son. Never knew he had a sister til now. We still don't have an ID yet, but we know who she is. Do you remember any more about the case?"

"Do you remember your first big case as a detective? Yeah, I remember. Besides, not that many shrinks get so deep in that kinda trouble, then get off damn near scot-free. Press had a field day with us over that one, if you can imagine."

"Oh, I can, believe me. How did he get off scot-free? He made a baby. That's DNA evidence with a bow tied around it."

"It was the 80s. We got DNA off the little girl when she was born and proved he was her father, but by the time we got the tests back, mom had signed off on the kid. She was in the process of getting adopted. The shrink...uh, Reynolds...Richards..."

"Rutherford."

"Yeah, that's him. He wanted nothing to do with the baby. Too bad none of the other women got pregnant."

"Wait, other women? There was more than one?"

"Logan, he only saw female patients. His patient list read like a Who's Who of the DSM."

Logan was glad this cop wasn't an ignorant ass and he was sure Goren would know what his comment referred to. "Be careful what you say about that if you ever meet Goren. He's real sensitive about that kinda thing. So how many of his patients was he doing?"

"All of 'em from what we could tell, but not one made a credible witness. Half of 'em were hearing voices telling them to screw him, and the other half thought we were the mind police, sent to steal their thoughts. Your buddy's mom was in the second half. So we tried to get him on soliciting, since they paid him for the treatment they got. The DA laughed at us. Our hands were tied. I tell you, that was the most frustrating case of my career. Some way to start off thirty years as a detective, huh? Glad they weren't all like that."

"Do you remember what led you to Mrs. Goren in the first place?"

"Her son called us, the junkie. We didn't pay him any mind, either, at first. Some family, huh? Your buddy's normal? What was he, raised by a distant uncle?"

"No. She raised him. I guess you could say he's the normal one. He's not a nut job or a junkie, despite what people may say about him. He's got his quirks, but he's a good guy, genius-smart. A good cop."

"That's a miracle from what I saw of his mother."

"When did you start believing Frank?"

"When his mother turned up pregnant and we found out there were other complaints."

"And the DA still wouldn't prosecute?"

"It was the dark ages, my friend. Mentally ill witnesses didn't count."

"Did you do any follow-up? You know, after the kid was born?"

Jordan shook his head. "Aside from the DNA sampling, nah. After the third or fourth try, we gave up trying to see her. And we had a hundred more open cases to clear. We moved on."

"Thanks, man," Mike said as he rose and extended his hand again.

"Glad to help. Good luck with your case."

Wheeler handed in the form and left the building with her partner. "Any luck?" she asked.

"Yep. He worked the case and he remembers it."

"After 26 years?"

"One of his first cases as a detective and a frustrating one. Some cases just stick in your craw. Yeah, even after 26 years, he remembered."

He tossed her the keys as they walked to the car. "Next stop is the Kings County Courthouse. The kid was adopted out through Brooklyn family court."

They'd stopped by Kent's office, waiting while she talked a judge into signing the order to release the adoption records of Frances Goren's daughter. He'd filled Wheeler in on the information Goren had gotten from his brother. "How did he take it?" she asked.

"Not well," he answered, and that was all he said about it.

Logan was being very protective of Goren at the moment, and he wasn't about to discuss Goren's mental state with her or anyone else. He could only imagine what his friend was going through, and he was going to do everything he could not to make the case harder for him.

* * *

><p>The clerk in the courthouse was even less cooperative than the sergeant at the 6-9 had been. After entering the information into her computer, she looked at her screen and said, "That was a sealed adoption, detectives."<p>

Logan leaned over the desk and held up the court order. "And this is a court order, signed by a real live judge, ordering the release of those records. We're investigating a murder, lady, and if you don't cooperate, that's called obstructing the progress of a murder investigation."

"Detective..."

"We don't like it when people obstruct us. That's why there's a jail term connected with it."

She glared at him before snatching the order from his hand and looking it over. "Where should we send the file?"

"Detective Logan, Major Case Squad, 1 Police Plaza, 11th Floor."

He watched her write down his information. "Expect it in seven to fourteen days," she snapped coldly.

"Make it two to five. We have a body waiting to be claimed and parents who don't know where their kid is."

She opened her mouth to argue, but he leaned over the desk. "Two to five, or we'll be back."

Turning, he left the office. Wheeler paused before following him out the door. "What was that, Mr. Personality?" she asked as they left the courthouse.

"What was what?"

"You think they'll send us the file when you want it?"

"Yeah, Wheeler, I do, because she doesn't want us coming back to see her. Sometimes, it pays to be a pain in the ass."

* * *

><p>Back in the squad room, Logan wrote up the information he'd received from Detective Jordan while Wheeler reviewed the crime scene reports. He looked up from his notes. "We need to get information from the AMA about a psychiatrist named Rutherford. He was the victim's biological father."<p>

"And that's all you have on him? A last name?"

"Just how many psychiatrists named Rutherford do you think were practicing in Canarsie in the 70s and 80s?"

"I guess we're going to find out, right?"

"As soon as we eat lunch."

She looked across the squad room to where Goren and Eames were working. "Are you going to tell him?" she asked.

"Do you think I can not tell him? Come on, Wheeler. This was his mother."

"And she's dead now, Logan. What purpose can it serve..."

"He wants to know, and I owe him that."

She raised her hands. "Okay, fine. You tell him."

"That was the plan," he retorted. "Now what did CSU find out?"


	5. Losing Focus

In the back corner of a small restaurant, Logan sat with Goren and Eames. Logan was pleased that Eames was with them. Goren needed that show of solidarity from her. They had been on shaky ground lately, and her presence was comforting for him.

As they ate their salad, Logan reviewed the progress he and Wheeler had made, such that it was. "We should get the adoption records in a couple of days. We stopped in at the local AMA office and, much to Wheeler's surprise, found only one practicing psychiatrist named Rutherford in Canarsie in the 70s and early 80s. When his abuses came to light in 1981, his license to practice was revoked and he was fined. No criminal charges were ever brought against him, though, because, well, you get it."

Goren nodded. "Because the mentally ill were not considered viable witnesses back then."

"They don't make great witnesses even now."

"No, but now there are people around who know how to talk to them and who listen to what they have to say."

He was getting agitated, and Eames placed a light hand on his arm. He closed his eyes for a moment and nodded. She withdrew her hand. He was calmer when he opened his eyes. "What else?"

"Well, Dr. Mitchelll Rutherford got to keep his Manhattan penthouse and his home in the Hamptons and his Mercedes and his trophy wife, who made a big show of standing by her man. He just couldn't molest vulnerable women any more."

"And?"

"I knew you were gonna ask for more, so I endured those questioning looks Wheeler gives me and I dug a little deeper. Wife came from money, so that was never an issue. They had more than enough to maintain their lifestyle. As they say, 'Those who can't, teach.' He took up a teaching position at NYU medical school, moving on from the mentally ill to the intelligent and vulnerable. Instead of raping middle aged housewives, he consorted with pretty med students who would do anything for a grade. It seems the man had an insatiable appetite for sex and would take it anywhere he could find it."

"Mitchell Rutherford..." Eames said quietly.

"What?" Goren asked.

"If it's the same Mitchell Rutherford, he was busted more than once for solicitation. I busted him myself two or three times."

"He tried to...solicit you?" he pressed.

Eames could see the storm building in his eyes. She nodded. "It was during my first year in vice. I would never have pegged him for a shrink. Shrinks are supposed to look like Skoda, not Cary Grant. He was a smooth operator, but he got busted just the same."

Logan was studying a printout in his hand. "Would ya look at that? I don't know how I missed your name here. But, yeah, he was busted a bunch of times for solicitation. He paid his fine and went home to his pretty wife."

"I wonder what she was getting out of it to stay with him through all that," Eames said. "I would have kicked him to the curb after the first bust."

"Satyriasis," Goren muttered.

"Gesundheit," Logan answered.

For the first time that evening, Goren smiled but it was brief. "Satyriasis is the term given to men who exhibit hypersexuality. In women, it's called nymphomania, which is a more popular term. It's, uhm, widely debated whether it's a true disorder or not. Some people believe that such a diagnosis would stigmatize a person who simply exhibits sexual behavior outside the comfort zone of most people. Some disorders and medications can cause hypersexuality, like bipolar disorder and obsessive compulsive disorder. Compulsion, addiction, normal variation...no one knows quite how to classify it."

"Giving it a name doesn't justify it," Eames commented.

"I'm not suggesting it does," Goren answered, becoming defensive.

"It's a coping mechanism," Logan interjected, seeing an argument brewing. He looked surprised. "I'm starting to sound like you now, Goren. Maybe we hang out too much."

Goren smiled again, settling back from his agitation. "You're right, though. Giving something a name makes it seem more, uh, manageable. Transforming it into a disorder indicates it's an aberration, something that can maybe be fixed. Either way, it gives an illusion of control."

"Do you find that comforting?" Eames asked. "Giving it a name?"

"Sometimes I do," he answered. "And I know you're uncomfortable with this discussion, so we can move on to something else."

"What makes you say that?"

"Your increased irritability, for one, and your obvious disapproval of the idea that hypersexuality might be anything more than degeneracy. You have your prejudices, Eames, and your sensitivities."

"Why do you think he never watches porn when you're around?" Logan offered, earning himself a glare from her.

Goren's mouth formed a half smile. "That's just being decent, Mike. Unless the woman initiates it, you don't watch porn around her. Most women don't like the idea of a man watching other women having sex."

"That usually only applies to dating couples, but thanks for the consideration," Eames said, annoyed.

Goren tipped his head to the left a little. "I didn't mean to irritate you."

She looked at him, mouth open to reply. Thinking the better of her retort, she simply rested her hand on his arm and smiled. "You didn't. It's okay."

"You went into vice..."

She raised a finger. "Don't," she warned. "Don't profile me. Now let's get back to Rutherford before you really do piss me off."

With a muttered apology, Goren turned his attention back to Logan, who asked, "So how many times a day does she tell you not to profile her?"

"You don't want to know. Rutherford's wife...is she still alive?"

"Alive and well and living it up on the Upper West Side." He studied Goren for a moment. "Bobby, we're not investigating him. We know he did it; there's no question of his guilt. A paternity test done when the baby was born proved it. There was no way to prove the sex wasn't consensual, so he was never brought to court. At most, it was unethical, which is why he lost his license. But the case is closed. We have to focus on finding the bastard who killed your sister."

_Your sister..._ The walls suddenly began to close in on Goren. "I, uhm, I'll be right back. Excuse me."

He rushed across the dining room, nearly knocking over a waiter, and went out the front door. Logan was the first to move, but Eames placed a hand on his arm. "I'll get him."

She rose and followed after her partner. Logan took a bite of bread and signaled their waiter. "We'll take those dinners to go, please."

He knew that they wouldn't be back.

* * *

><p>Goren stood halfway down the block from the restaurant, leaning back against a building, drawing deeply on a cigarette that was already half-gone. Eames approached him silently. She learned the hard way that accosting him with phrases like 'What's wrong with you?' was not the way to deal with him. She leaned back against the building, standing beside him, close, but not too close. "You okay?" she asked, expressing real concern.<p>

He rubbed his left eye. "I don't know."

"Talk to me, Bobby," she said softly.

He finished his cigarette in silence. After tossing his butt toward the gutter, he said, "I don't know, Eames. The idea of having a sister...I can't wrap my head around that. I feel...betrayed, robbed of something I never knew I had to start with. And what do I do with it? My mother is dead. The bastard who did that to her is dead. My sister..." His voice faltered and he took a moment to recover. "My sister is dead...dead, before I ever knew she was alive. I could take it out on Frank. He knew and he never told me, but where would that get me? It won't bring her back."

"No, it won't. I don't know what to tell you. I can't make this better. But I can tell you what I see."

"Oh, please do," he responded sarcastically. "That's something I need to hear."

She chose to ignore his tone. "Yes, it _is_ something you need to hear. So stop being an ass and listen to me. I see a sensitive man, torn apart by a decision he had no hand in making. I see a man who desperately wants justice for a woman the system failed, but it's too late. And I see a man who is grieving for a life he never knew. I see no fault in any of that."

He turned to look at her. "But...what do I do with it?" he asked.

She reached out and rested her hand on the side of his face. "You have to find some way to deal and then you move on."

"Some way to deal," he repeated. "And if I can't?"

"Life's not always fair, Bobby. I learned that when I lost Joe. Nine years later, I still have days where I ask why? Why him? Not a day goes by that I don't miss him. I can't say I ever accepted his death, yet I found some way to set it aside and move on with my life. People die, but life goes on. Life's been rough for you lately, but you'll get past it. And when you feel that you can't, just call me. I'll always be there for you."

Had she not been in physical contact with him when she said it, her words would never have had the impact on him that they did, and he would never have done what he did next. But she did, and they did, and he did.

Leaning over, he touched his temple to hers and paused. She didn't jerk away. Slowly, he turned into her, his cheek brushing against hers, and then his mouth was on hers and her arms were around his neck. He pulled her closer, kissing her hard as a tumult of emotion pounded at the gates to be released. He withdrew suddenly, before he lost all control. The very last thing he wanted to do was offend her, and he had the idea she might be offended if he took off her clothes in the middle of the street. He backed away from her, not taking his eyes from her face, and then he turned and hurried away.

Eames was stunned. His kiss had taken her breath away and seared her senses. By the time she recovered, he was too far away for her to pursue, so she stood there, staring after him until he was out of sight. She didn't move until Logan came up behind her. "Where'd he go?"

She shook her head. "I don't know." She held out her keys, too shaken to drive. "Would you take me home, Mike?"

He took the keys from her hand. "Yeah, okay."

He drove her home, then walked to the subway and took the train back to Brooklyn.


	6. Questionable Judgment

It was getting late, but he couldn't help himself. He stopped for a few drinks, but he could not drive the things Logan had discovered out of his head. Had he been completely sober, he would never have done what he did next.

Standing in front of the stately Upper West Side building, he just stared at it. The doorman watched him with suspicion. A man like him, a common man, somewhat disheveled, more than half drunk, did not belong in front of this upscale Riverside Drive building. He belonged in Bed Stuy, in Flushing, in Flatbush, in the Bowery, not here on the Upper West Side, a world apart from the one he knew.

It had taken him no effort at all to discover the address of Eunice Rutherford, Mitchell Rutherford's widow. She was a fixture on the charity circuit. She lived a life of privilege. And once he'd had enough scotch to drive all sense from his head, he caught a cab ride to Riverside Drive. The doorman now approached him. "May I help you, sir? Call you a cab perhaps?"

Goren shook his head. "I just got out of a cab," he responded. "I am where I intend to be."

The doorman was getting more nervous. "I'm afraid I must ask you to move along or I will have to call the police."

Goren shoved his hand into his pocket and fished out his badge. "I am the police, and I'm here to see Mrs. Rutherford."

The doorman was confused, but he had been at his job far too long to pry. He asked no questions as he walked to the door and held it open for Goren. "Mrs. Rutherford lives..."

"Yeah, I know where she lives."

The doorman closed the door, watching the cop approach the elevators and punch the 'up' button. Mrs. Rutherford had a succession of male callers, but he did not recall ever seeing that one before, and he would have remembered him. The cop was as different from her usual type as he was. She preferred softer, more artistic types, young men who couldn't decide if they were gay or straight. She seemed to enjoy helping them make their decision. He didn't think that cop was confused by his sexual identity, so he wondered what business he could possibly have with her. He often wondered about the people who lived in his building, but that was all he could do. In the thirty years he'd worked for the rich, he had never even come close to understanding them.

* * *

><p>Goren stood in front of an ornate door that led to the living complex of Eunice Rutherford. He gathered himself and rang the bell, then he waited.<p>

He did not expect her to answer her own door, and his surprise must have shown. She smiled at him. "You don't expect me to answer my own door at this hour?"

"Not at any hour, actually."

She stepped aside. "Come in."

He accepted her invitation. "Do you always invite unannounced strangers into your home this late at night, Mrs. Rutherford?"

"Bernard would not have let you into the building if you did not have business with me."

He pulled out his badge and showed it to her. "This is what got me into your building."

"And rightly so, if you actually are a police detective."

"I am. Robert Goren, Major Case Squad."

Some of the color drained from her face, but she kept her composure. "Well, you obviously aren't here to cause me problems or you would not have given me your name and squad...unless you aren't Robert Goren."

He pulled his ID badge from his pocket and offered it to her. She examined it and nodded with satisfaction. "You are who you say. So what can I do for you, detective?"

He studied her, observant despite his state of intoxication. "You...You reacted to my name. Why?"

"I did?"

He nodded, motioning toward her face. "Your face...you blanched, uh, went pale. That's not something a person can control. You recognized my name."

"Goren." She sighed. "I have not heard that name in a very long time."

"Twenty-five years maybe?"

She nodded. "Something like that. Please, sit down. May I get you something? Coffee? Another drink, maybe?"

She could tell he was intoxicated, but she wasn't afraid of him. Was she that trusting or did he project his harmlessness so well? He didn't think it was either. "No, thank you."

She sat down in a chair set at a forty-five degree angle to the one he occupied. "Mrs. Goren was one of my late husband's...indiscretions."

"She was my mother...and she was his patient."

"She was also his undoing, through no fault of her own." She paused. "What can I do for you, detective? You obviously cannot have business with Mitchell and I don't think you're here on your mother's behalf."

"No, ma'am. My mother recently passed away. My business is with you. I just...I wanted to see for myself the kind of woman who stays with a man like that."

"A man like that...Do you mean the disgraced psychiatrist or the man who had more appetite for sex than one woman could fill?"

"Either. Both."

She studied him closely for a long moment. "You judge him harshly, and I can't blame you for that. God knows Mitchell was not a perfect man but he was a good, attentive husband and I loved him. I understood the excessive nature of his libido. He filled all my needs and I gave him the freedom to fill his. Few understood our arrangement, but it worked for us."

"You didn't care about the sex as long as you were the only one he gave his love to."

She looked at him with surprise. "You understand that?"

He nodded. "Yes, I do. You were fortunate to have found each other, to have a mutual understanding so you could both be happy in your marriage."

"Is that how your marriage works?"

His eyes darted away from hers and he shook his head. "I've never been married."

"No? A handsome man like you?"

"Looks aren't everything. There's a lot of, uh, baggage that comes along with me. But that's not why I'm here." He shifted restlessly. "Mitchell didn't hide my mother's pregnancy from you?"

"Of course not. Mitchell didn't hide anything from me. The child to whom your mother gave birth...they performed a paternity test which proved Mitch was her father. That was the moment things began to fall apart for him. It was difficult for me to watch his world unravel. It took almost fifteen years to kill him, but eventually, it did." She paused. "I couldn't have children so she was the only child he had. By the time we found out she was his daughter, she was already in the foster care system, in the process of being adopted by another family, cloaked in a shroud of secrecy. It was too late, and Mitchell refused to sue the state for paternity. I would have taken her in, raised her as my own had I known your mother didn't want her. he didn't want to ruin another couple's chance for happiness."

"It's not as simple as wanting or not wanting the baby, Mrs. Rutherford. My mother was schizophrenic. The baby was taken from her because she wasn't mentally competent to take care of her and she had no one around who could help. I was in the Army at the time, overseas. I never knew."

"When did you find out?"

"Yesterday. She...my sister...was murdered and her case fell to a friend of mine."

Eunice studied him as a pall of sorrow descended over her. "I am so sorry." She cocked her head and leaned toward him. "You never knew her but you grieve...for what might have been?"

He nodded, eyes bright with unshed tears. "And for her."

She sat back. "How long have you been a law enforcement officer, detective?"

"All my adult life."

"So...all her life and then some?"

He nodded again. "Something like that, yes."

"So many years of dealing with death and depravity, and you can still shed a tear for a girl you never knew. By this point, most police officers are calloused to death."

He shook his head. "I, uh, I never developed the callouses."

"So I see."

"You're good at reading people."

She smiled. "It's easy when the person you're trying to read wears his heart on his sleeve like you do."

He looked embarrassed. "I...I don't mean to..."

"It's harder to hide when you've been drinking."

He nodded. "I shouldn't have come, but if I didn't do it now...well..."

"I know. Sober you would never have turned up on my doorstep."

"I, uhm, I'm sorry..."

"No need to apologize. This could not have been easy for you. But you are a detective and I understand that curiosity drives you. And it's curiosity that brought you here, maybe against your better judgment."

He grinned. "Definitely against my better judgment. My partner will be furious."

"So don't tell him."

"Uh, her. And that never turns out well for me."

She reached out and gently took his hand. "So, tell me...what do you know about Mitch's daughter?"

He shook his head. "I don't even know her name. All I can tell you is that she was pretty, athletic, with dark hair."

"She would have been what? Twenty-five?"

He nodded. "Beyond that, I can't tell you anything."

"Can you tell me how she died?"

"Drowning."

"An accident?"

He shook his head. "No. That much we know. We're still investigating, and I can't say anything more about it."

"I understand." She continued to hold his hand. "You are going to find out who she was, aren't you? Who her parents are?"

He nodded. "Yes. We'll find out."

"Then I have something for you. Excuse me for a moment."

He watched her leave the room. She was a lovely woman with a nice figure, easy on the eyes. She had succeeded in making him more comfortable. She wasn't gone long, returning with a gym bag, which she set on the coffee table. "When we found out about her, we expected to be contacted for child support. Then we found out about the adoption. I still expected to be contacted at some point, human nature being what it is, maybe when she got older and became curious about her biological parents. I started putting away the money we would have spent on child support." She gave him a somewhat sheepish smile. "I admit, I have no idea what the going rate is for child support. I set aside $1000 a month. If you don't think that's enough..."

He raised his hands and leaned back in his seat. "I have no idea. Child support is set by the courts."

"Well, you can let me know later, if you find out the amount was insufficient. I also added extra money for special occasions—birthdays, Christmas, First Communion, graduations. Any time I thought of a milestone. I haven't counted it, but I believe there's around a quarter of a million in that bag, maybe a little more. Please, when you find her parents, give it to them with my condolences. They can use it for whatever they need. After all, they were the ones who made the sacrifices and endured the heartaches of raising her."

"They also suffered the joys," he pointed out.

She nodded. "True. The rewards are endless, but the sacrifices are also great. They deserve this money."

"Suppose you'd never found her?"

"There is a provision in my will for this bag, which I can now have removed."

"You're putting a lot of faith in me."

She smiled. "And my faith is not misplaced, Detective Goren. I don't know who I can trust more than a police officer."

He sighed. "And how do I explain suddenly having a quarter of a million dollars in my possession?"

"There is a letter in the front pocket of the bag, from my lawyer, explaining where it came from and who it is for. The family will not pay taxes on back child support. There is also a letter I wrote to the family, in the main compartment with the money. You will not suffer for being the messenger. Please. Perhaps it will mean more coming from you, given your closer relation to the girl."

He looked at the bag and slowly nodded. "It will get to the family, once we find out who the family is."

"Handle it however you see fit."

He shifted uncomfortably. "I, uh, thank you. It's getting late. I-I should go."

She nodded. "Thank you for coming to see me, even though your better sense told you not to. I would not object if you came by again. Maybe to let me know what kind of people raised Mitchell's daughter?"

"I'll consider it."

"Are you sure I can't get you something before you go?"

"I'm positive."

She walked him to the door, where he turned toward her one more time. "Good night, Mrs. Rutherford."

She leaned forward and kissed his cheek. "Good night, Detective Goren. And thank you for your consideration. The child's life was poorer for not knowing her older brother."

He wasn't sure he agreed, but he didn't argue. Carrying the gym bag, he left. She continued to watch him until he was gone.

* * *

><p>He caught a cab outside the building and he stared at the gym bag for the entire ride home. Eunice Rutherford was taking a huge chance with this amount of untraceable cash, giving it to someone she didn't know from Adam. Of course, this was money she wrote off long ago, money she could afford to give. And now her conscience was clear. The rest of it was in his hands.<p>

He paid the cab fare and went into the house. Unlocking his door, he stepped inside and froze. From the corner of his eye, he caught movement in the living room. He moved his hand to the gun at his hip, on edge until a familiar voice said, "It's about time you came home."

He relaxed and moved his hand away from the butt of his gun. "Eames," he said as he dropped the gym bag by the kitchen table. "What are you doing here?"

"I was worried about you," she said as he came into the room.

"I'm okay," he assured her.

"You weren't the last time I saw you..." she stopped.

He smelled of scotch and cigarettes...and _perfume_. She backed away from him. "Maybe you're right. I shouldn't waste my time worrying. You know how to handle your tension."

He looked at her, confused by her sudden change of attitude. "What?"

She tossed her hands in the air. "Never mind, Goren. Forget I was even here."

As she began to storm past him, he grabbed her arm. "No. I want to know why you're upset. I didn't do anything wrong."

"No? Who is she?"

"She who?"

"The _she_ I can smell on you!"

"What are you talking about?"

"Do you think I'm stupid?" She punched his shoulder. "I can't believe I was worried about you when you were off..."

"Talking," he said gently. "I was just talking. I didn't even take my jacket off."

She glared at him, eyes blazing with fury. "Don't you _dare_ lie to me!"

"I'm not." He laughed softly. "Why are you so angry, Eames? Even if I did sleep with someone, why should it matter to you?"

"What? No...it doesn't..."

He motioned toward the couch, and she sat down, thoroughly confused. He sat beside her and quietly explained, "I went to see Mrs. Rutherford."

It took a moment for the name to register, but when it did she looked at him in shock. "You did _what_?"

"I went to see Mrs. Rutherford," he repeated with less confidence.

"What the hell were you thinking?"

He shrugged. "I...I guess I wasn't. But it turned out okay."

She huffed and rubbed her hands on her pants. "Bobby, this is not our case, and it's not okay for you to interfere with Logan and Wheeler's investigation."

"I didn't. This was a personal visit. I didn't go as a cop. I went as...as her brother...to find out a little more about the man who molested my mother."

"At the very least, you should never have gone alone."

"Why? Who would have gone with me?"

"Did you consider that maybe I would?"

"I did, for all of about a minute and a half. Then I envisioned your reaction, and I saw what just happened here."

She sighed. "Okay, maybe you're right. But Logan would have gone. You barely have to talk him into anything. He's always ready to go off half-cocked to investigate one of your hunches. That's why Ross cringes whenever you two start talking."

He chuckled softly. "He does, doesn't he?"

"Yes, and I don't blame him."

"Are you still mad?"

She studied his face. "No, Bobby. I'm not mad."

"Can you explain why you went off on me when you thought I was sleeping with someone?"

"No, I can't."

"I just want to understand why it matters."

She looked at her hands. "You were so upset. I just...I worry that you'll make a mistake you will end up regretting."

"So who am I supposed to sleep with? Do I have to get your approval first? What are the rules?"

If his expression hadn't been sincere, she would have gone off on him all over again, but he really wanted to know what she expected from him. She wanted to answer him, but she didn't know what to say. "Bobby..." she trailed off, still uncertain.

He moved closer to her. "What?"

She could smell the mix of odors on him, a potpourri of scents she would forever associate with him in her mind. He pressed his forehead against the side of her head and whispered, "Just tell me what you want from me."

She closed her eyes, acutely aware of his closeness, of his overwhelming presence and the sheer..._maleness_ of him. She trembled inside, every sense focused on him. She turned her head toward him, surprised to find his mouth right there and suddenly on hers, like it had been outside the restaurant. She fell back onto the couch, drawing him with her, and every ounce of sense fled from her mind. Without thinking, without considering the consequences, she gave herself to her partner, and he let her.


	7. Trust

The sun was barely up when the doorbell roused Goren from a sound sleep. Gently extracting himself from his partner's arms, he pulled on his boxers and a t-shirt and went to the door. Logan was on the doorstep. "Hey. I stopped by last night but you weren't here. I wanted to make sure you were okay. Are you?"

Goren stepped aside and let him in. "I'm about as okay as I can be," he answered, wiping the sleep from his eyes.

"You look wiped."

"I was up late. I need to talk to you, but I'll make coffee first."

Logan sat at the kitchen table and watched him. "How wasted did you get last night?"

"Not too bad. I stopped by to see someone."

Logan arched his brows suggestively. "Someone I know?"

"Rutherford's widow."

All humor left Logan's demeanor. "Please tell me you're kidding."

Goren focused on making the coffee, and when he didn't answer, Logan said, "Bobby, I told you we aren't investigating Rutherford. He's dead, and so is his victim. There's nothing to investigate."

"That's not why I went. It had nothing to do with your investigation, I swear."

"Then what was the point?"

"The point," came a voice from the hallway. "The point was his insatiable curiosity drove him to go."

Logan's brow arched in surprise. "I thought I dropped you off in Queens last night."

"I got worried so I came back."

"And stayed?"

Goren placed his fists on the table, leaning on them, and looked Logan directly in the eye. "And stayed," he said, daring his friend to make something of it.

Logan looked at him, intimidating even in boxers and a t-shirt. Then he looked at Eames, wearing one of her partner's shirts and, it appeared, nothing else. There was a tremendous amount of trust being thrust at him, trust that Goren placed in no one else, except Eames. Logan grinned. "Okay, then what did old lady Rutherford have to say?"

Goren hesitated for a moment, then he retrieved the gym bag, dropping it on the table and turning to grab three coffee cups from the cupboard. "What's this?" Logan asked.

"Open it and see."

He looked at Eames, who shrugged. She had no idea what was in the bag. Logan unzipped it and they looked inside. "Holy shit," he said with a soft whistle. "Where the hell did this come from?"

"There's a letter in the front pocket."

Logan found the letter and opened it. Eames read over his shoulder. It was typewritten on letterhead from the firm of Richmond, Brenner and Castille, and it explained the purpose of the cash within the bag.

Logan looked up at Goren. "Child support?"

Goren handed him and Eames each a cup of coffee. Retrieving his own cup, he sat down. "Yes. Eighteen years' worth. She entrusted it to me to deliver to my sister's parents when we find them."

"That's what? Two hundred grand worth of trust?"

"Maybe closer to three, but yeah."

"That's a lot of money, Bobby," Eames said.

"I know, and it belongs to her parents."

Logan took a drink of coffee. "I hope to God they deserve it."

"So do I," Goren responded.

"Did you find out anything else?"

He shrugged. "She would have taken the baby in if she hadn't already been placed for adoption when they found out. She's a...a nice lady. She said my mother was Mitchell's undoing, that after she got pregnant, his world began to unravel and it took fifteen years to kill him, but she holds no animosity for it. But my visit to her had nothing to do with your case. Like you said, you're investigating my sister's death, not her paternity. I just...I had to find out."

Logan nodded. "Yeah, okay. I get that. I do have a question for you, though."

"What's that?"

"Did the state do the right thing this time, taking the baby?"

Goren sat down and looked at Eames. Finally, he answered, "Taking the baby from my mother, yeah. She couldn't take care of a baby in her mental state. But they failed in their next responsibility, to try to locate another blood relative who could care for her. I wasn't hard to find, and I would have taken her. That's where they dropped the ball."

Eames reached out and placed her hand over his. He met her eyes as he closed his fingers around her hand. Logan watched them, then quietly asked, "So what's going on here?"

Goren looked at him. "What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean."

"You have to ask?"

Logan met his eyes, holding his gaze before he smiled. "I guess not."

"Ross..." Eames began, but Logan waved his hand, dismissing her concern.

"He'll never hear a word from me. This is between the two of you, and personally, I think it's a good thing. It's something both of you deserve."

Eames looked skeptical. "What do you mean by that?"

"Just what I said. He's the best thing to come along for you since you lost your husband, and you're the best thing to come along for him, period. Now get dressed, both of you, and I'll spring for breakfast."

Goren followed his partner down the hall into his bedroom. "Uhm, just what is it that we have here, Eames?"

"I don't know, but it's good, don't you think?"

He stepped up to her, fingered her hair and gently eased the the t-shirt up and off. "It's good," he agreed, leaning down to kiss her as his hands caressed her back. "It's very good."

His hands continued to roam over her warm skin and she smiled. "Logan's waiting," she protested softly.

"Let him wait," he replied.

In that moment, she realized just how much Goren really did trust Logan, and she trusted him enough to go along with it.

Twenty minutes later, they came out of the bedroom. Logan gave them a knowing smile. "Shut up, Logan," Eames snapped without venom.

With a laugh, Logan clapped Goren on the back. Goren grinned as he grabbed the gym bag and they left the house. He did trust Logan, and no one had to explain what a big deal that really was. They knew.

* * *

><p>Logan was leaning against Goren's desk, joking with him, when Wheeler got there. Goren shifted, his collar riding down a little, and Logan grinned. He gestured toward his own collar. "I see someone got a little...enthusiastic this morning."<p>

"What?"

Logan gave him a meaningful look, and he touched his collar. "Oh, uh, yeah..." He made a soft sound of embarrassment, but his eyes took on a faraway, almost dreamy look.

Logan was glad he had a distraction until he saw Ross get off the elevator. He gave Goren a meaningful nudge, bringing him sharply back to reality. His mind scrambled for an appropriate topic as the captain approached. "So yeah, the mayor's mansion was the dump site, and it was damn near sterile. Whoever killed her didn't really leave any trace on the body or at the scene. We haven't found the kill site."

Ross looked at him. "Logan, a minute."

Logan met Goren's eyes and he shrugged, following Ross to his office. As Ross hung up his jacket, he said, "I'm not sure it's a good idea bringing Goren in on your case. He's too close."

"You're kidding, right? Come on, captain. This kid was his sister, and that news totally blindsided him. He's not on the case. All I'm doing is keeping him in the loop. But if he sees something Wheeler and I missed, where's the harm?"

Ross studied him for a moment. "All right, Logan. You can fill him in. But watch him. I don't want this to turn into a catastrophe."

"It won't. I'll tell Eames to keep him on a short leash."

"Have you checked with Missing Persons?"

"Yeah. Nothing matching her description yet. Maybe no one's realized she missing."

"Maybe no one is close enough to care."

Logan looked through the office windows at Goren. "For his sake, I can't believe that."

"Okay, so run with the idea that she wasn't raised in the city. Check the surrounding counties as well."

"Will do. Oh, how's the mayor's wife?"

"Still recovering."

"Hm. I didn't realize she was such a delicate flower."

"Watch it, Logan."

He grinned and left the office. Stopping behind Eames, he said, "Captain says to keep him on a short leash. He doesn't want this case turning into a catastrophe."

"What does he think I'm going to do?" Goren asked.

"That's just it," Eames said. "He never knows."

Logan shook his head with approval. "Always keep 'em guessing, buddy."

As he headed to his desk, Goren called to him. "Have you checked with Social Services in Brooklyn? They'll have had a file on my mother from back then. I, uh, I'd like to know what they had to say."

"We'll check that out today. I'll let you know."

"Thanks, Mike."

Turning back to his desk, he tried to shift his attention to the case he and Eames were working. He relied on Eames to help him focus, but their early morning activities had him as distracted as Logan's case did. He wondered what it meant, but he was reluctant to ask, afraid that whatever it was, it was something more to him than it was to her. If that were the case, he honestly didn't want to know.

* * *

><p>Logan and Wheeler were gone for most of the day, returning late in the afternoon. Logan pulled an envelope from his inbox and looked at the return address. "Well, what d'ya know...Brooklyn Family Court. What'd I tell ya, Wheeler? They sent it over by courier. She really didn't want me coming back to see her."<p>

She gave him a look. "I can't say I blame her."

With a laugh, he winked at her as he opened the envelope. Sitting down, he pulled out a file folder as Wheeler scooted her chair around to look with him.

"Okay..." Logan said. "Here we have Frances Goren listed as the child's mother and Mitchell Rutherford as the father. Her name was Samantha Hadley Fullerton. Her adoptive parents are Kyle and Riley Fullerton. At the time, they lived in Westchester County." He pulled out a photo that had been included with the file, the picture that was taken before she left the hospital for the foster home she lived in before the adoption was final. "She was a cutie."

"Does it say anything about her foster parents?"

"Uh, Owen and Gwen Thorndyke. They lived in, hm...they lived in Canarsie. Small world. I wonder how close they lived to her mother."

"Let's find out." She wheeled back around to her desk. "Give me both addresses."

Typing as he spoke, she entered the addresses into the computer and hit 'enter.' She looked up at him. "They only lived a few blocks from Mrs. Goren."

"Hmpf. Doesn't that beat all? The kid was born on June 2nd, and the adoption was finalized on the 4th of September, 1982. So for the first three months of her life, Samantha lived with her foster parents just a few blocks from her biological mother."

Wheeler shuffled through a stack of papers on her desk. "Yeah, but for at least half that time, Mrs. Goren was hospitalized. The baby's birth took a toll on her mental stability. She was paranoid and delusional. The social worker reported that she was especially fearful for the well-being of her younger son, though they never knew why."

"Bobby was the younger son. There's a long history of her 'concern' for his well-being," he said without elaborating. Bobby had given him some details and he knew about 'them.' "Where was she hospitalized?"

"The psychiatric ward at St. Clare's."

"Let's get those files, too."

"Are they relevant?"

"They will be to Goren."

When she hesitated, he leaned over his desk and leveled a gaze at her. "This is hard for him, Wheeler, and getting the most information we can will give him a more complete picture of what happened. It may not matter to anyone else, but it does to him."

"And that makes it important to our case?"

"Yeah, it does, because he's my friend, and I want to do right by him on this one thing."

She considered it for a few moments. "All right. We'll go to St. Clare's in the morning." She looked over at Goren and Eames' empty desks. "When are you going to tell him we have an ID?"

"I'll swing by his place on my way home. It'll be easier for everyone if I tell him at home rather than here."

"Are you going to call Eames?"

He shook his head. "Nah. I have a feeling she's not going to let him out of her sight for too long, not until this case is resolved. Short leash, the captain said."

"And you think she'll take him literally?"

"Don't worry, Wheeler. He's not your problem. I'll see you in the morning."

She watched him walk to the elevators before packing up her things and heading for home herself.


	8. Reality Strikes Hard

Goren unlocked his front door and went into the house, leaving the door open for Eames. After tossing his binder on the desk in the corner of the living room and setting his keys, wallet and badge on the counter, he went into the kitchen. Grabbing a tumbler and a bottle of scotch from their respective places, he poured himself a drink. A large drink. He was still reeling from all the new information about his family that had come raining down on him over the last two days. Additionally, he really didn't know what to make of what was happening between him and Eames. He was honest with her when he told her it was a good thing, and Mike's assertion that it was good for them both reinforced that, but he was becoming increasingly uncertain. That the change in their relationship was good for him, he had no doubt. She took the edge off everything and kept him from spiraling completely out of control. What he questioned was whether or not he was good for her. That was where his real doubts kicked in.

He heard the front door close, and he took a beer from the refrigerator. Taking that and his drink into the living room, he handed her the beer. She looked at the glass in his hand. "Talk to me," she encouraged as she led him to the couch.

He sat heavily beside her. "I...I just don't know what to think, Eames. I'm...numb. Like when you get hit too many times in one spot. After awhile, you stop feeling anything at all."

"Until the bruise forms."

He nodded. His bruises had not yet begun to form, but when they did, the pain would be significant. "What happened last night?" he asked suddenly.

She thought about the question before answering, "You were there."

"I know, but...what does it mean? For us? I don't...I don't know what to think about it."

"Do you have to think anything at all? Can't you just let something happen?"

"No, I can't. Not with you. You're too important to me. I can't risk fucking it all up with a mistake."

She frowned. "You think it was a mistake?"

"I'm afraid it was, yes."

"Why?" she challenged.

"Because if it brings us to odds, then a few nights of pleasure simply aren't worth it."

She gave that some thought, and he was right. "I agree. It's not worth a few nights. So what would make it worth it? A few years? A decade? How about a lifetime? Would it be worth it then?"

He rubbed the back of his neck and looked at her with a puzzled expression. "Are you bartering with me?"

"I'm trying to find out what you think would make it worth sleeping with me."

"Why?"

"Because that's what I plan to give you."

His puzzlement deepened. "What?"

"If you think I'm worth a few nights, then fine, that's what I'll give you. But if you think I'm worth a lifetime, well...then you're stuck with me."

"You mean...you...you want..." The words stuck in his throat as though bringing them forth would change everything.

"Do I want you?" she asked. "I absolutely do...if you're willing to take me."

"You have no idea what you're getting yourself into. I'm difficult and moody and..."

She silenced him by placing her hand over his mouth. "And you talk too much, yeah, I know. After eight years, I think I know your flaws. I also know your strengths. I know how you think and feel. I can even predict how you'll respond in most situations. I knew exactly what I was doing when I stayed last night. If you want it as much as I do, then I'll stay tonight, and tomorrow, and for however long you want me. But if you don't want in for the long haul, tell me now and I'll go home, no hard feelings. Just don't lead me on."

"You think I would?"

"Maybe that's one of the few scenarios I can't predict because you keep that part of you hidden from me."

"So how do you know I'm what you want?"

She set her beer on the table and took his drink from his hand, setting it beside the beer. Sliding her leg over his, she straddled his lap, reassured by his obvious reaction while trying not to think he would have reacted the same way for any woman who did the same thing. "Sometimes we can't dictate what the heart wants. We just have to accept it and go along with it or live with the damn thing broken for the rest of our lives." She leaned down and brushed her lips over his. Another reaction, this one stronger. "My heart wants you."

He placed his hands on her hips, sliding them up her sides. "Your heart was broken once," he said softly.

"This is your chance to fix it, or to break it for good."

"Don't put that on me, Eames."

"I didn't, not consciously. I can't help how I feel. I can't help that you are the one I fell for."

His heart tumbled at her confession. "I don't want to hurt you, but I...I'm afraid that I'm no good for you. You deserve someone who isn't...damaged, someone who can give you the world without being consumed by it. You don't have to be afraid to hurt me. My heart was never whole to begin with."

"Did it ever occur to you that maybe the only one who can fix your damaged soul is another damaged soul?"

He shook his head, but she could tell he was thinking about what she said. "I don't think mine can be fixed."

"Does it matter what I think?" she pressed. "Or have you made this decision for both of us?"

"Of course it matters. And I haven't made any decisions."

"Then consider this. I'm not doing this for you. For once, I'm doing something for me. It just happens to involve you. This is the last chance I'm going to take, the last one I have to make myself whole, and you're the one who can do it. I haven't found anyone else since I lost Joe until I found you. Believe me, Goren, I am not settling. I struggled with my feelings for a very long time. It's something we both have to face and deal with. I fell in love with you. You're the one, the only one, so if you're not willing to help me mend the life that fell apart when Joe died, then I just have to resign myself to the fact that I will never be whole again. I will never again be a complete person, no matter how tough I appear on the outside. We both have facades that we turn to the world to hide what we are deep inside and we have both erected walls to keep everyone else out. Now we have to decide whether or not we want to let each other in, to open ourselves to the pain and pleasure of loving each other." She stroked his hair with both hands. "And maybe, just maybe, I can help your heart to heal as well. Maybe there's a chance, however small, that I can make your heart whole, even if it's never been whole before. I would really like the chance to try."

His hands came to rest on her waist and he studied her face. He saw determination and honesty, and he saw love. "I don't want to hurt you," he repeated softly, emotion constricting his throat.

"It's a chance I'm willing to take. There's no way for us to avoid hurting each other from time to time. It's the nature of the beast. But the hurt will be nothing compared to the joy we can get from each other, if we allow ourselves the chance."

"You're going to be stubborn about this, aren't you?"

"You're damn right I am. I want this, Bobby. I want _us_. We deserve a chance."

She brought her hands down to rest on his chest. Slowly, he nodded. If she was willing to take a chance on him, he couldn't say no to her. "Are you sure you know what you're getting into?"

"Absolutely. Eyes wide open. I don't own a pair of rose-colored glasses. I left them behind when I left high school."

His mouth curved into a small smile. "And if it all falls apart, can I say I told you so?"

She leaned forward, looking directly into his eyes. "Do not go into this expecting failure. Put in the effort that the relationship deserves. No regrets."

His eyes filled with sudden pain. "I'm afraid of this, Alex. Nothing in my life has ever worked out for me. I don't want to lose you. I...I couldn't handle that kind of loss."

"Then fight for what you want. You can create your own destiny, like you did with your job. If you want me bad enough, then fight for me."

"The only reason I fought so hard for the job is because you came with it. You _were_ what I was fighting for."

"So then keep fighting. Fight for this. Fight for us, for what's happening between us. We can make it work if we really want it to, but we have to put forth the effort to make it survive."

His eyes roamed over her face, straying down over her body and then back. She fought to keep still, wanting his response to be from his heart and not from...other places. His gaze finally came to rest on her eyes. "I would do anything for you."

She smiled. That had been the answer she'd been hoping for. Now she was going to push one more button, to be clear and unequivocal with her words. She kissed him softly and whispered, "I love you."

She felt him tense, but before he could respond, the doorbell rang. Reluctantly, she slid off his lap so he could answer the door. He gave her a look that lingered before he walked away.

He pulled open the door and scowled at Logan, who recognized the look. "I'm interrupting. Sorry."

Goren stepped back to allow him to enter and they went into the living room. As Logan sat down on the couch, Eames smacked him and he tried not to laugh. "Yeah, I know. I interrupted. I already apologized." He held up the folder in his hand. "I got something."

Goren's expression turned to one of interest. "From?"

"Brooklyn family court. Your sister's name was Samantha Fullerton," he answered gently as he held out the folder. "We're in the process of tracking down the family as well as the foster parents who had her before the adoption went through. Wheeler and I will be going to St. Clare's tomorrow. That was where your mother was after the birth and for much of the three months preceding the adoption. I'll let you know what we find out."

Goren was looking at the adoption paperwork. "Thanks, Mike."

"I have one more thing," Logan said as he reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and pulled out the picture of newborn Samantha. He held it out to Goren, who set down the file and took the picture, his hand trembling. He stared at the baby's image for a long time before he handed it to Eames and walked away.

Eames looked at the picture. "Oh, my God," she whispered. She got up and walked to one of the bookcases. Taking down a photo album from the top shelf, she sat beside Mike and opened it, leafing through it until she found the picture she wanted. Laying Samantha's picture beside it, she showed them to Mike. "Wow," he said. "They could be twins."

"All the science pointed to her being his sister, and his rational self was convinced she was. But this picture, this picture brings his emotional self in line with the truth. Now, he has no doubt of who she was."

She shoved the photo album into Mike's lap and went into the kitchen after Goren. He stood at the sink, leaning on braced arms, head hung low, eyes closed. Slowly, she stepped up to him, gently running her hand over his back as she rested her head against his arm.

She didn't say a word, which he appreciated more than anything else she could have done. All the questions that stumbled around in his head would forever go unanswered. He forgave his mother for everything. He forgave her for the beatings, for the dark closets she locked him in, for her affair with Mark Ford Brady, for giving him life...but this...this was one thing for which he would never forgive her.

He gently pulled away, leaned over to kiss her and softly said, "I'll be back."

Logan watched him walk to the door, grab his jacket and leave without a word. "Where's he going?"

Eames folded her arms across her stomach. "He'll be back," she said simply.

Logan leaned back on the couch as she sat in the nearby recliner. In companionable silence, they waited. Eames was willing to give him the space he needed, to a certain extent. Then, she would gently draw him back to her. But right now, all she could do was wait.

* * *

><p>Walking normally calmed him, but not tonight. As he left the subway station behind, every step he took toward his destination notched his anger up a little bit more. By the time he stopped in front of the apartment door, he was struggling to control a dangerous rage.<p>

When the door opened, he shoved his brother hard, knocking him backwards across the room. "Hey!" Frank protested.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Tell you what?"

"About the baby!"

"Baby? What baby?" It took a few moments for the subject to work its way through the cloud of drugs that fogged Frank's brain. "You mean Mom's baby?"

"Of course I mean Mom's baby! Why didn't you tell me?"

"I told you, I promised her I wouldn't. She cried, Bobby. She cried when she begged me not to tell you. Every time I thought about it, all I could see was her crying and I couldn't bring myself to tell you. I just couldn't. Besides, what good would it have done? She was gone by the time you got home. It was a closed adoption."

"I'd've found a way. I'd've found her." He poked his finger in the air toward Frank. "You were wrong! You should have told me! You should have..."

Turning, he left the apartment. Frank went to the door. "Bobby...I'm sorry."

"You always are, Frank," he answered without looking back. "And it's never enough."

* * *

><p>Dark cemeteries at the stroke of midnight—a scene most people avoid. But that was where Eames and Logan found him—sitting on the ground in front of his mother's grave. He'd had a lot to drink, and it took the two of them to get him home and into bed. Then Logan crashed on the couch and Eames crawled into bed with Goren. In the dark, she held him as tears rolled silently down her cheeks. All she could do was wish away his pain and hold him in her arms, so that was what she did.<p> 


	9. Meeting the Fullertons

Eames and Logan went in to work together, leaving Goren sleeping at home. Before she did anything else, Eames went to the captain's office. "My partner won't be in today, captain."

"Why not?"

"He's taking a sick day."

"And he couldn't call it in himself?"

"Not really. He's kind of out of it."

Ross studied her with deepening suspicion. "Get in here and close the door, Eames."

With a frustrated sigh, she did as he asked. Ross asked, "What's going on with him?"

"Captain, he's having a very hard time with this. He just found out he had a little sister, and she's dead. His mother and his brother have kept it from him all these years and there is no way for him to confront his mother about it. That's a lot to process. Put yourself in his place."

"All right, Eames. He can have the day. Has he put any effort at all into his own case?"

"Of course he has. I have a couple of witnesses to contact today. We're making progress."

"Very well." She started toward the door. "Oh, is there something I should know about you and Logan?"

"No. Why?"

"I noticed that you've been arriving at the same time lately."

"Have we? Would you prefer that I call him in the morning to coordinate our arrivals at different times?"

He shook his head. "No. Forget it. It was a ridiculous thought to begin with."

"I couldn't agree more."

She left the office feeling like she'd dodged a bullet.

* * *

><p>Logan had a hard time convincing Kent that Frances Goren's 1982 hospital files from St. Clare's could be relevant to their case, but he finally managed to get the court order he wanted. As they drove to the hospital, Wheeler said, "Assuming that Goren had power of attorney for his mother, he could have gotten those files without a court order."<p>

"I know that, but where would the fun in that be? Besides, I want to see what's in them and he's out sick today."

"Is he okay?"

"Not really. Did you have any luck locating the Fullertons?"

"Yes. They moved from Westchester County to Connecticut in 1985. That was where Samantha grew up."

"Do you have a current address?"

"Yes. In Darien."

"I guess we're taking a trip to Connecticut once we're done at St. Clare's."

She was quiet for a minute. "What if we find out she didn't have a good life?"

Logan was quiet for awhile before he answered, "We'll jump off that bridge if we come to it."

* * *

><p>They didn't run into any obstacles at St. Clare's. The records clerk was only too happy to process their request after a couple of minutes of flirting with Logan. She promised the records would be in the mail by the end of the week. As they walked back to the car, Wheeler said, "That was nauseating, do you know that?"<p>

"Whatever it takes to get the job done, Wheeler."

"I'm surprised she didn't climb across the desk and jump you right there."

"So am I. Good thing I had you along, huh?"

She gave him a look and shook her head.

* * *

><p>The ride to Connecticut was interminably long and uncomfortably silent. Logan was dreading the upcoming conversation with Samantha's parents and he was apprehensive about what they were going to find out about the girl. He wasn't much in the mood for conversation.<p>

They pulled up outside a modest, well-kept home. "Well, here we go," Logan muttered.

He felt a heavy weight on his shoulders as they approached the porch and knocked on the door. The woman who answered was about his age, attractive and pleasant. "May I help you?" she asked.

He held up his badge. "Mrs. Fullerton, my name's Logan and this is Wheeler. We're detectives with the Major Case Squad in New York and we'd like to talk to you about your daughter Samantha."

"Sammy isn't home, detectives. She's actually down in the city. She's a teacher at a private school in Manhattan."

"Do you mind if we come in, ma'am?"

Riley Fullerton nodded and stepped back so they could enter. The living room was warm and inviting, with pictures adorning every wall. "Uh, Samantha's an only child?"

"Yes, she is."

"Do you hear from her often?"

"She usually on Friday night. Every couple of weeks she comes up for the weekend, and she's home for holidays. Why?"

When he faltered, not knowing how to continue, Wheeler took over. "Mrs. Fullerton, I'm afraid we have bad news for you. Your daughter was found murdered last week, and we are investigating her death."

"No. That's not possible."

"Have you heard from Sammy since last Tuesday?" Logan asked gently.

"No, but she had papers to grade or tests or something. She's not gone. She can't be. She's our only child."

"I'm very sorry," he said.

She began to shake. "I have to call Kyle. I need my...I...my husband..."

"Wheeler..." Logan motioned toward the woman as she unraveled before them.

Wheeler moved to sit beside her, sliding her arm around the woman's shoulders. "If you give us his number, my partner will call him for you."

"It...It's by the phone."

Logan waved a hand. "Got it."

He rose and walked to the phone in the kitchen. Opening an address book beside it, he flipped to the 'S' listing. 'Sammy' was written in a careful hand, followed by an address and phone number, which he wrote in his notepad. The listing after it was 'Sammy's work' followed by St. Michael's Academy with an address and phone number. He made note of that as well. He flipped to the 'K' listing and found Kyle's work number, which he dialed. He got a secretary. "Fairfield County Credit Union, Mr. Fullerton's office."

_Great. A suit._ "Is Mr. Fullerton in? This is Detective Logan of the NYPD."

"I'm sorry, but he's at lunch."

"Do you know where he lunches?"

"He had a business lunch at the Holiday Inn today."

"Do you have a number?"

"One moment."

She returned to the line with a phone number.

"Thanks," he replied, hanging up and dialing the number she gave him.

"Holiday Inn Stamford."

"I'm calling for Mr. Kyle Fullerton. This is the police."

"One moment, please."

While he waited, he looked around the kitchen. Stuck to the refrigerator with magnets was a child's drawing of three people, a dog and a cat, each labeled with their names: Mommy, Daddy, Sammy, Mercury and Cleo. It was a bright, happy picture. _So far, so good,_ he thought.

"Hello? This is Kyle Fullerton. You're the police?"

"Yes, Mr. Fullerton."

"Is my wife okay?"

"She is at the moment, but you need to get home right away."

"I'm on my way."

Fifteen minutes later, the front door opened. Riley completely fell apart when her husband came into the room while Logan and Wheeler stood by, uncomfortable. Kyle turned to them. "Our daughter was killed? How did that happen?"

"That's what we're trying to find out," Logan assured him. "I apologize that it's taken us this long to notify you. We were only able to identify Sammy in the last day or so. We had to request the adoption records from the court in order to find you."

"How did you know she was adopted?"

Logan took a deep breath and explained, "She had no identification on her and we were not able to match her to anyone in the missing person's database, so we ran her DNA on the off chance we might find something. Her DNA was a strong partial match to one of our officers. It turns out Sammy was his sister."

Kyle stiffened. "We met him before the adoption."

Logan met Wheeler's eyes before answering, "No, sir. You didn't. The man you met was Frank, the oldest sibling. He has a younger brother, Robert, who was in the army at the time, overseas. He never knew about the baby. Not until two days ago, anyway."

Kyle deflated a little. "We didn't know there was another brother."

"Yeah, there is. And he's really torn up about this. You see, if his mother and brother had told him about the baby, he would have stepped up and taken care of her. At the very least, he would have wanted to be part of her life. As it was, he never had the chance. Whether that was a good thing or not, no one will ever know, but he would have been good to her, I can guarantee you that. It'll really be a big help to him, knowing she was raised in a good home by loving parents."

Still sitting on the couch, holding his wife, Kyle faced him with tears in his eyes. "Sammy was everything to us. She never wanted for a thing and we adored her."

Logan looked around at the pictures. "Yeah, that's the impression I get."

"Mr. and Mrs. Fullerton," Wheeler interjected. "We are going to need for someone to come to the city and identify Samantha's body."

Nodding, Kyle said, "I need to take care of some business first. I'll drive down first thing in the morning."

Logan wrote down the address of the medical examiner's office on the back of his business card. "Here's the address. Please give me a call when you get to the city and we'll meet you there."

Riley had composed herself somewhat. "Detective Logan, the younger son, Robert...do you know him well?"

"Yes, Mrs. Fullerton, I do."

"Is he...like his brother?"

He could hear the contempt in her tone. "No, he's not."

"His mother, she was very sick."

Logan nodded. "He had a difficult childhood, but he overcame that and became a good man. He's one of the few who beat the odds."

"How has he handled, you know, finding out about Sammy?"

"Not well at all."

She wiped her eyes, but kept her hand closed around her husband's arm. "I would like to meet him."

"I'm sure he'd like that. I'll let him know."

With a nod, Kyle extended his hand. "Thank you for coming to tell us in person, detectives. I will call you in the morning when I get to Manhattan."

As they walked to the car, Wheeler said, "They seem like a nice couple."

"Yeah, they do, but everything isn't always as it seems, Wheeler."

"What do you mean?" she asked as they got into the car.

"When he came to the phone and confirmed I was the police, his first question was if his wife was okay. When I told him he needed to get right home, he didn't ask any questions. I get the impression they were good parents and that Sammy had a good life, but there's something, I don't know, off with the missus. I'll have a chat with him when he comes to the city in the morning."

They returned to the city and spent the rest of the afternoon reviewing the crime scene evidence for any leads to the person who had murdered Samantha Fullerton.

* * *

><p>After work, Logan drove Eames to Goren's apartment and they went up to check on him. He was sleeping on the couch. Eames sat beside him and gently stroked his hair. He shifted and slowly opened his eyes, looking up at her with a soft groan. She smiled. "How about a glass of water?"<p>

He nodded and slowly sat up, scrubbing his face with his hands. Logan sat beside him. "I'm not even gonna ask how much you had to drink. We had a helluva time getting you home."

"Thanks," Goren muttered. "I, uhm, I appreciate it."

"What? That we didn't leave you sitting alone in the damn cemetery all night?"

"How did you know...?"

"I didn't. She did."

"Oh."

Eames returned with a glass of water and some toast. "You should eat something. Keep this down and I'll fix you something more substantial."

He drank the water and replied, "I have a hangover, Eames, not the flu."

Logan snorted. "For you to be hungover, you had to have drank enough scotch to float the entire Pacific Fleet."

"Almost," Goren grunted as he got up and made his way unsteadily to the bathroom.

Eames watched him with concern. Logan squeezed her arm. "He'll be okay. We'll get him through it."

She met his eyes and offered him a brief smile. "Yes," she said. "We will."


	10. Ruminations

Goren returned to the living room and sat heavily on the couch. His hair was damp and so was the front of his t-shirt. His appearance was the last thing on his mind, and he knew it didn't matter to either Eames or Logan, anyway. Eames moved closer to him and gently touched his ear. He turned his head toward her, reassured when she smiled. "Feel better?"

"Tell me how better is supposed to feel."

She leaned forward and gave him a soft kiss. "Like that?" she offered.

He finally gave her a soft smile. "Then I feel better."

"Before you two start in," Logan interrupted as he nudged Goren's shoulder. "I need to talk to you."

Goren drew his attention from Eames, but he settled his hand in her lap, where she took it in both hers. "About what?"

"About your sister's adoptive parents."

Goren tensed apprehensively. "If they weren't good parents, I'm not sure I want any details right now."

"By all the evidence I could find, they were excellent parents. Nice home up in Darien, Connecticut. Father's a banker. Pictures of the kid all over the house, and she sure doesn't have that haunted look that abused kids get. They were devastated. She was a teacher at St. Michael's Academy, and we'll follow up on that after the father comes down to ID the body."

"I want to be there for that."

Logan nodded. "I'm okay with that. I don't know if he'll bring his wife. He kinda acted like she was fragile. But she did say she wanted to meet you."

Goren arched a brow in suspicion. "Why?"

"Because I told them you were a good man. Frank didn't make a very good impression."

"If they remember him after all these years, he had to make an impression of some sort."

"Maybe it was the stress of dealing with the baby's birth or your mother's protracted illness after it."

"It could have been both or neither. Maybe it was just an excuse for him to get high."

"Like he needs an excuse," Eames muttered, and Goren squeezed her hand.

"Well, whatever his excuse, they seemed glad to have taken the baby from her sick mother and junkie brother."

"What else did you tell them?"

"Just that you didn't react well when you found out about the sister you never knew existed, that you would have stepped up and been responsible for her if you'd known."

"That was why my mother never told me. It would have been a constant reminder of her failure, and she would have hated me for it. On some level, maybe she did hate me because she knew that I would have taken care of the baby and she couldn't. She probably blamed me because she had to give her up...before she convinced herself that she never existed in the first place."

Eames squeezed his hand in a comforting gesture, and he felt grounded. He took a deep breath, fidgeted, and added, "My mother was very religious in her own way. She was thrilled when I told her that Frank had found God, all proud of him. The only way she lived with the secret without throwing it in my face was to convince herself that it was all a delusion, that the pregnancy and birth were a concoction of her sick mind."

Eames slipped a hand free and pushed her fingers through his damp hair. He closed his eyes and drew in another deep breath, drawing stability from the contact. Logan clapped his hand on Goren's shoulder. "I'm going home. I need to, uh, water my houseplant."

"That thing's not dead yet?"

"Not quite. There's still some green on it, I think. I never professed to be a gardener."

"Good thing you never got a puppy," Eames quipped.

"Last I looked, puppies weren't green. See you guys in the morning."

Goren called his name, then quietly said, "Thanks."

Logan nodded. "Sure thing. Good night."

When Logan was gone, Goren turned to his partner. "I'm sorry," he said.

"For what?"

"Uh, about last night. I...I got lost. I was so...angry, and I had nowhere to focus that anger."

"So you turned it inward."

"Kind of."

"Do you remember last night at all?"

"I do, but it's fuzzy."

"How did you get to the cemetery?"

"I think I walked. I stopped by to tell my brother that he's worthless and then I went to a bar I know near the cemetery. I kind of lost track of what was going on."

"It's dangerous when you do that."

He nodded. "Thank you for coming after me."

She smiled. "That's what I do."

He drew her into a hug, and she gently poked his ribs. "I think it's amazing that you walked to the cemetery because you didn't do very well going from the car into the house."

"Uhm, did I do anything I should apologize for?"

"Why would you think you did?"

"Alex...I...I'm losing control over my life. I'm unraveling, and I can't reel it back in."

She moved, sliding herself back onto his lap, where she'd been when Logan arrived. She could feel the tension in his body. Tenderly, she cradled his face and softly said, "I know this is hard for you and I can only imagine the grief and betrayal you feel, but it's going to be okay. You have to believe me on this. You'll get past it. I promise."

He placed his hands lightly on her hips. He was unable to see the light at the end of the long, oppressively dark tunnel through which he was traveling, but she made him believe that the end was ahead, somewhere. Maybe it was even close.

She slid her hands toward the back of his head as she leaned forward and kissed him. He moved his hands gently up her back, pleased by the tremor he felt beneath his fingers. His tension began to slip away as she deepened the kiss, and he started to believe her; that somehow, it was going to be okay.

She broke the kiss only long enough to lead him down the hall and remove her clothes. When they crawled into the bed, he drew her into his arms and loved her. Afterward, she fell asleep in his arms.

He watched her sleep for awhile before slipping gently from her embrace. He went into the kitchen and fixed himself a pastrami sandwich on rye. Sitting at the table with a beer, he ate, but his mind wasn't on the food. It was still in the bedroom with her.

She was unique in his life. He'd had plenty of girlfriends, plenty of lovers. Initially, he chose them because he wanted to sleep with them. Sometimes, deeper feelings developed. More often, they did not. If he enjoyed the sex, he stayed in the relationship until she moved on. If not, then he was the one who moved on. His lack of emotional investment didn't mean he didn't care about them. After all, he'd ventured into homeopathy for Lola's cat. But he was unwilling to take risks where his heart was concerned. He could play the game. He could say the words without completely meaning them. He could fool almost anyone. He'd learned from the best of them; he was William Goren's legacy.

And then came Eames. During the very first days of their partnership, he was intentionally difficult. In some ways, he resented having a female partner. He didn't have much experience with female partners and knowing she'd worked vice had not helped matters any. Deakins gave him about as much choice in the matter as he'd obviously given her, that was to say, none. She seemed even less excited about being his partner than he was to be hers. So their first six months or so were pretty rocky. The hard-nosed vice cop versus the unstable maverick from narcotics. They butted heads often and he was stubbornly unyielding over even the most minor points. She was Eames and he was Goren, and to this day, he could not say when he had become Bobby to her. She was still Eames, but her name was now spoken with warmth and respect instead of disdain. And he was learning to call her Alex.

It came as no surprise to him that she had written a letter requesting a new partner. And he had been honest with her when he told her he was lucky she withdrew the letter. They'd never spoken of it again, though he often wondered why she withdrew it. Maybe someday he would feel himself in a place where he could ask, but now was not that time. With all that had happened over the past year, from her kidnapping to his mother's death to the results of the paternity test that confirmed for him the horrifying truth that he was the son of Mark Ford Brady, he felt like he was walking on quicksand, like the ground beneath him could give way at any moment.

His relationship with Eames grew, and with time, he came to respect her, to trust her, and finally, to love her. She was the only woman in his life who entered his heart before she ever climbed into his bed. By using the depth of his feelings for her as a gauge, he could honestly say he had never loved a woman before. She filled nearly all the empty spaces in his heart and was as close as anyone had ever come to being a salve for his wounded soul. He had tried not to taint her with his life, but she would have none of it. She pushed and pushed and pushed until the door popped open and she was in his heart, past all his defenses, beyond all the walls—and he knew of no way to get her out, so he welcomed her.

In his mind, he always made strict distinctions, especially about relationships. He seduced women, and he knew it. But Eames had somehow seduced _him_. He didn't think she knew it or that it was what she ever intended, but the fact remained—that was exactly what she had done. In bed, he always fucked a woman. Always, except with her. He never fucked Eames. With her, it was always love. In his mind, in his heart, with his body, always he loved her. She was the only woman with whom love came first, before their first kiss, before they ever got into bed. First, there was love. And it made him dizzy, giddy almost, and he liked it. For the first time he felt that he'd done something right, and he was trying like hell not to screw it up.

Day after day, he watched her. He'd been watching her for years. She'd warned him once against profiling her, under pain of some yet-to-be-discovered penalty, a vague threat he took very seriously, but he couldn't help it. It was what he did. So he tried hard not to be obvious about it. He knew when she was dating, and he could always tell the next morning when she'd had sex the night before. He felt troubled over the jealousy that crept up from God only knew where. He was very uncomfortable with those feelings, knowing they shouldn't be there, that he had no right to feel that way. He also knew when it was over, and he cursed himself more for the feeling of relief that came with it. He wasn't sure how she felt about the men she dated, but he felt fairly certain she hadn't been in love. The pain of losing Joe was still too raw. Over time, he saw less of her grief, but he knew she still missed him and that was only right. Unlike him, Eames had found love. But she'd also lost it and that made her reluctant to give it another try, to open herself to that pain all over again, especially with another cop, where the likelihood of loss was so much higher.

Yet, from time to time, he would catch something, something fleeting, in her eyes, something he never saw before and couldn't interpret. He was hard-pressed to admit he didn't try very damn hard, because on some level, he knew what the flash of something was, and it made him very uncomfortable. It increased with frequency over time. It was there when he said something that amused her, and it was there when he did something that made her laugh. It was there when he was in pain. But most surprising of all, it was there over the past year as he watched his mother die, more steady, more frequent, more pronounced, until finally it never went away. Still, he tried to pretend it wasn't there, but he knew because he _felt_ what he saw in her eyes, and he knew it was love.

He finished off the last bite of his sandwich and the last swallow of beer. As he set his dish in the sink and dropped the bottle into recycling, she came up behind him. Her arms were cool as she slid them around his waist, and her face was cool where she rested it against his back. "Eames," he said softly.

"Alex," he corrected.

She hummed an answer; he felt the vibration of it against his skin, and he smiled. "I love you," he whispered, almost hoping she didn't hear him because he'd never said those words before and meant them. He'd only ever used them as a tool to get what he wanted. Except for his mother, he'd never loved anyone else, but he loved her, and he meant the words.

She pressed her cheek into his back. "I love you, too," she replied after a moment.

She'd heard him, and she believed him. She dragged her nails lightly over his skin, and a smile played at the corners of his mouth. "Come back to bed," she invited.

He didn't need her to ask twice.


	11. A Father's Grief

Just before ten the next morning, an officer led Kyle Fullerton to Logan and Wheeler's desks. Logan rose to his feet. "Mr. Fullerton."

Fullerton accepted Logan's outstretched hand, then shifted uncomfortably. "I'm sorry to be this late, detective. My wife...well, she's having a hard time with Sammy's death. I think, if you could arrange it, maybe it would be beneficial to her, if she could meet Sammy's brother. The good one. Talking to him might be very helpful to her, and her therapist agrees. Maybe, she could help him come to terms as well."

Logan nodded. "I mentioned to him that she wanted to meet him. He agreed, and he said he wanted to be present when you identified her, if that's okay with you."

"That's fine. Can we please get this over with? I...I can't tell you how I feel about this. She was...my little girl."

The man's eyes grew misty, and Logan laid his hand on Kyle's shoulder. "This way, sir. I'll introduce you to Detective Goren first."

He led Kyle to an interview room. Wheeler asked, "Can I get you something to drink, Mr. Fullerton? Coffee, maybe?"

Kyle nodded as he sat down. "I would appreciate that. Thank you."

While Wheeler got coffee for the grieving father, Logan approached Goren and Eames. He leaned on Goren's desk. "Mr. Fullerton is here. Are you ready to meet him?"

Goren looked at his partner before he nodded. "I'm as ready as I'll ever be, I guess."

Logan clapped a hand on his shoulder. "Come on."

Taking a deep breath, Goren got to his feet and followed Logan across the squad room. As they entered the interview room, Kyle Fullerton set aside his coffee and stood. Logan touched Goren's arm. "Mr. Fullerton, this is Robert Goren, Sammy's brother. Bobby, her father, Kyle Fullerton."

Goren held out his hand. "It's a pleasure to meet you, sir."

Kyle accepted Goren's hand, sizing him up as he shook his hand. "Detective Logan speaks highly of you, detective."

Goren acknowledged the compliment with a nod. "I, uh, I'm sorry, sir, for your loss."

Kyle's eyes got moist again. "Thank you. I wish you could have known her."

"So do I."

"I've been told you have consented to meet my wife."

"Yes, sir. Whenever it's convenient for you."

"Do you mind coming to our home in Darien? I'm afraid the trip down here to the city would be too taxing on her right now."

"I understand. It wouldn't be a problem for me."

"Would Saturday work?"

Goren shifted uncomfortably, but he kept his discomfort under control. "That would be fine."

"Detective Logan can bring you up. He knows where the house is."

"Uhm, if...I mean, would you object if my partner came as well? She..."

He trailed off, not quite sure how to express his need for his partner's steadying presence. Logan came to his rescue. "She's an important source of support for him, Mr. Fullerton."

"I understand, and I have no objection. Come for lunch. I'll fix something worth the trip to Connecticut."

"That's very generous of you, Mr. Fullerton."

"It's settled, then. Saturday. Now..." He gathered himself. "Detective Logan, I would like to see my daughter."

Logan nodded. "This way, sir."

He and Goren followed Kyle from the room, and Goren motioned to Eames. She joined them at the elevators. "Mr. Fullerton," Goren said. "This is my partner, Alex Eames."

Eames shook his hand. "I'm sorry for your loss, Mr. Fullerton."

"Thank you, detective."

Logan inclined his upper body toward her. "The three of us have been kindly invited to lunch at the Fullerton home on Saturday," he said.

Eames wondered for a moment at his formality, quickly deciding that he was trying rather awkwardly to set Kyle at ease. She nodded at the grieving father, who was trying hard to appear professional and stoic. "That is very kind of you, Mr. Fullerton."

Kyle looked at Goren. "Well, it's family," he said quietly.

Goren became tense, but not obviously so. Eames brushed her fingers over his hand, and he settled. Logan noticed; Kyle did not.

The elevator let them out on the basement level, where the morgue was located. Assaulted by the odors and the brightness of the hallway, Kyle froze as the detectives exited the elevator. The first to realize Kyle had not followed them, Goren turned, moving to block the doors before they closed. He leaned toward Kyle, speaking softly. "This is difficult, sir, but it's something that has to be done. Then she can go home, and you can lay her to rest properly." He paused. "I'll be with you, if that means anything."

Kyle looked into warm, brown eyes that were dark with grief, and he found the strength to get off the elevator. "Thank you, detective. Thank you very much."

Goren nodded and motioned for Kyle to follow Logan. Eames fell into step beside him, once again touching his hand in a gesture of affection and support. He briefly closed his hand around hers and squeezed, but he didn't look at her. She understood.

Logan had made arrangements for the identification, so Rodgers was ready for them. She led the small group to a gurney in a small room. Normally, the family looked in through a glass window, but due to the special circumstances of the victim's identity and the presence of the three detectives, Rodgers allowed them into the room. She gripped the sheet and looked at Kyle. "Are you ready, Mr. Fullerton?"

Kyle squared his shoulders and tried to brace himself. He nodded, and Rodgers pulled back the sheet to reveal Samantha's young face. Kyle looked at her but didn't react immediately. Up until that moment, he had allowed himself the luxury of the belief that it might not be Sammy on the coroner's slab. Once the sheet was folded back, however, that luxury evaporated and he was blind-sided by reality.

Time stood still for several seconds as Kyle looked at the pretty face of his only child. Then, he let out a sob. "Oh...my...God...Sammy..."

He had struggled to maintain his composure since arriving at the headquarters building, but now, it was too much for him and his emotional reserve crumbled. He began to shake as sobs wracked his body. "Sammy...my little girl..."

As his knees buckled, Goren and Logan grabbed him, supporting the sobbing, grief-stricken father before he hit the floor. Rodgers settled the sheet back in place as they guided Kyle from the room. Goren took half a second to look at her. She met his eyes, holding his gaze until he turned away.

They returned to the eleventh floor, to the same interview room. Goren sat with Kyle while Eames got him a bottle of water and Logan slipped away to his desk, to talk with Wheeler. Goren stayed with Kyle as he recovered from the shock of seeing his daughter in the morgue. Although he was uncomfortable, Goren felt it was his duty to offer what consolation he could to the man who had raised the little sister he never knew he had. His sister's father. It was a lot for him to manage, and he frequently sought eye contact with his partner, who had returned to their desks, offering the two men a degree of privacy. She was watching, though, and when he sought her, she was there for him.

* * *

><p>Logan looked at the administration building that was the first accessible structure on the campus of St. Michael's Academy. Built of stone, it had a forbidding, Gothic look about it, like some churches did. He gazed past the building to find a campus filled with less menacing structures interspersed among green lawns and tall, mature trees. "Nice," Wheeler commented.<p>

"If you like this kind of thing. I went to school in a single building. No dodging raindrops and lightning strikes between classes."

"Pessimist."

"I prefer to think of myself as a realist."

"In your case, it's the same difference."

They began walking toward the building. "Wheeler, you wound me."

"You exaggerate, too."

Laughing, Logan opened the door for her and followed her into the stone structure. A short, stocky woman sat behind a desk, watching from behind thick, heavy glasses as the detectives entered the office. To Logan, she looked like the female version of Mr. Magoo. "May I help you?" she offered in a warm, friendly voice.

Logan held up his badge. "We'd like to talk to the principal."

The woman reached out and took his badge, holding it in both hands with reverence as she examined it. Returning the gold shield, she said, "Oh, dear, this isn't about Steven Williams again, is it?"

Logan looked at his partner before answering with an amused smile, "Uh, no, ma'am. It's about something else entirely."

"Wait right here, officers."

They watched her stand and shuffle her way to the office door behind her, returning after a minute. "Father Gregory will be with you in just a moment."

Logan looked around at the various plaques and framed awards adorning the walls around the office. "What grades are taught here?" he asked.

"All of them. We enroll students from kindergarten through grade 12." When he nodded, she asked, "Are you considering sending your children here?"

He laughed. "Uh, no. I don't have any kids."

Before the secretary could reply, and before Wheeler inserted the comment behind her grin, a tall, thin man dressed in black with a priest's collar at his throat, came from the back office. He was younger than Logan expected, athletic with a full head of sandy hair. Intelligent brown eyes peered from behind dark-framed glasses. He motioned them to follow him, closing the door once they entered his large, spartan office. Logan held out his hand. "Father, I'm Detective Logan and this is my partner, Detective Wheeler."

Father Gregory shook each of their hands. "How may I help you, detectives? Has one of my angels strayed?"

Logan smirked. "Something tells me you have a number of fallen angels here."

"We have our share, yes, but I haven't given up on them."

"More power to ya, Father, but we're not here about a student. We want to talk with you about one of your teachers, Samantha Fullerton."

"I'm afraid Miss Fullerton is out sick with the flu."

Logan and Wheeler exchanged a look. "Who told you that?" Wheeler asked.

"Her boyfriend called last week."

"Do you have a name or any contact information for this boyfriend?" Logan asked.

"His name is Daniel," Father Gregory replied as he walked to a file cabinet to retrieve a file folder. Opening the folder he found the information he wanted. "Daniel Farragut, a descendant of Admiral David Farragut, I'm told."

"Does the Admiral's descendant have an address or a phone number?"

"May I ask what this is about, detective? Do you have a court order or something?"

"No, sir," Logan answered. "But we can get one. You see, Miss Fullerton was murdered last week and we are investigating her death."

Father Gregory stared at him in shock. He barely managed to make it back to his chair before collapsing into it. He crossed himself and whispered a prayer. "Murdered..? How...How did it happen?"

"She was drowned."

Taking time to recover, the priest then took a pad of paper and wrote on it. Tearing off the sheet, he held it out to Logan. "Samantha listed him as an emergency contact. That's all the information I have about Mr. Farragut. If I can help in any other way, please, let me know."

"Were there any students she had a particularly close relationship with?"

Father Gregory thought for a few moments. "I don't know of any off hand, but I will find out."

"Do you know of any trouble she had with any students?"

"No, I don't. If she did have serious trouble with anyone here at school, I would have known. But I will ask around."

"Do you mind if poke around some? After all, it's what we do."

The principal studied the detectives. "News of this sort would be best coming from me," he said. "I should break the news before you begin to question anyone."

Logan turned his head to look at his partner, and they reached a silent agreement. "We would like to be present when you do that, Father," Wheeler said. "If we can observe the reactions people have to the news, we might be able to get information we might otherwise miss."

Father Gregory nodded his agreement. "How would you like to handle it then?"

Logan said, "If we can bring in a couple of colleagues, and you can make the announcement individually to manageable groups...that would be incredibly helpful."

After a brief internal dialogue, the priest consented. "I can do it your way."

"We'll make a call to get another pair of detectives here as soon as possible. I'd like to start with the oldest students."

Father Gregory nodded again as Logan pulled out his phone. He called Eames. "Hey, it's Logan. I've got a favor to ask...We're at St. Michael's Academy, where Samantha Fullerton taught, and we need a hand. Can you and your partner get here right away?" He paused as he listened, then gave the school's address. "Great. Thanks, Eames."

He slid his phone back into his pocket. "They're on the way. While we're waiting, would you mind answering a couple more questions, Father?"

"Not at all."

"What did she teach?"

"She was a brilliant young woman, very adept at teaching. She was able to reach even the most difficult students. Her primary class was eleventh grade history, but she tutored students at all levels in science and math, from first grade through twelfth. She was very adaptable and could connect with six-year-olds as easily as sixteen-year-olds."

Wheeler looked at Logan, who smiled softly. That sounded very familiar. "Did I miss something?" Father Gregory asked.

The detectives exchanged another look before Logan answered, "She sounds a lot like her brother."

The priest looked confused. "I thought she was an only child."

Wheeler explained, "She was adopted, Father. When she came to us, she was unidentified. During the process of identifying her, we discovered that she was related to one of our co-workers. Further investigation led to the discovery that she was his sister. He never knew she existed until now."

"This must be difficult for him."

Recalling the effort it took for him and Eames to get Goren home the other night, Logan nodded. "You have no idea, Father."

"If he wants to talk, I'm a good listener."

"Thank you. He'll be here soon. You can make your offer to him in person."

The secretary appeared in the doorway. "Father, Mr. Carson is here to speak with you about Evan."

Logan and Wheeler rose. "We'll wait in the outer office. Thank you for your cooperation, Father," Logan said.

The detectives stepped into the outer office so the principal could get on with his business while they waited. Wheeler leaned toward him. "Why them, Logan? Don't you think Goren is too close to this?"

"Yes and no. I think it's important for him to feel involved in this, even if it's not his case. Kinda like you investigating your father's disappearance."

"Or you investigating Holly Lauren's death?"

He started unconsciously at the mention of the young woman's name. It wasn't like him to fall so fast for a woman, and her death had hit him hard. His loss came close on the heels of Goren losing his mother, and he'd found himself at his friend's door after Holly died, seeking what, he had no idea. Whatever he needed, though, he'd found it with Goren, and somehow, they'd comforted each other. The friendship that began at Brooklyn Federal Prison continued to evolve once Logan transferred to Major Case, but that night it deepened into a brotherly bond that was missing elsewhere in their lives.

Neither of them said any more as they waited for Goren and Eames to arrive.


	12. Nightmare

Eames set her phone on the desk in front of her. "That was Logan," she said. "He's asking for our help at the school where Samantha taught."

"What kind of help?"

"He didn't say, but he asked if we could get there right away. Are you up for it?"

"I'm fine, Eames."

She knew he wasn't fine. Kyle Fullerton's visit had left him deeply shaken, and there had been little she could do to help him there in the squad room. But he seemed eager to help Logan and Wheeler, and it was probably a good idea for them to get out. "Okay, then," she agreed. "Let's go see what they need."

They gathered their things and headed for the elevators. Although they were alone in the elevator car, they were very aware of the cameras that constantly recorded elevator activity, so they remained silent, physically removed from one another.

Once they were in the car, she slipped the key into the ignition, then turned to look at him. "That was hard for you," she said softly.

He looked down at his binder, sitting closed in his lap. He knew she was referring to Kyle Fullerton, and it had been very hard for him to watch that father's pain. But it had been much worse for the man who had raised Sammy, who had known her and loved her. His fingers played with the edge of his binder as he shrugged. "It had to be done," he deflected.

"Bobby..."

"Can we talk about it later? Please?"

His pain was still too raw, and he was still shaken from Kyle's meltdown after he identified his daughter's body. Goren was able to put himself in Kyle's place much too easily, and Kyle's grief had reopened the raw wounds he still felt after losing his mother.

Eames hated when he deflected her concern, but she was beginning to understand why he did it. His own pain was almost more than he could handle. If she tossed her own emotions at him, it would be too much. She started the car and turned to back out of the spot. Unexpectedly, he leaned over and kissed her. She looked at him, and he met her eyes, but just for a second. Then he looked away.

Her heart did a flip and she smiled a little. He was learning to defuse her irritation, which pleased her. He was making an effort to connect with her. She reached out and briefly played with the hair that curled at his temple. Then she backed the vehicle out of its spot and drove toward the exit.

When Eames teased his hair, though briefly, he felt a sudden surge of desire which caught him by surprise. Little things like that caught him off guard, but they also went a long way toward reassuring him. Still off balance from his mother's death, the discovery of a little sister he never knew and never would had knocked him for a loop and left him teetering on the brink of a very deep and dark chasm. Eames and Logan were all that kept him anchored in the light. Without them, he would be utterly lost.

Once they were clear of the parking garage and had traveled a couple of blocks, Goren reached out and closed his hand around hers. He didn't look at her or they wouldn't make it to St, Michael's, but he derived a great deal of comfort from the simple contact of holding her hand. She tightened her grip on his hand, and he relaxed. Leaning his head back, he closed his eyes. _Just for a minute..._

She woke him a few blocks from the school. He looked around, gathering his bearings, surprised that they were almost there. "I...I'm sorry..."

"Don't be. You haven't slept well the past few nights. It's bound to catch up with you eventually."

"You noticed?" he asked, embarrassed.

"We've been in the same bed, Bobby. You're restless; I notice."

She was surprised that he was upset by that. At the next red light, she released his hand and lightly rubbed his thigh. "What is it?"

He quickly reclaimed her hand before she caused a different problem entirely. "The last thing I want to do is disturb your sleep," he admitted.

She thought that over as the light changed, not sure how she could reassure him. Lightly, she stroked his thumb with hers. "If it becomes a problem, I'll go out on the couch for a night or two."

That didn't reassure him. In fact, he became more uptight. "I need to find a way to...sleep better, I guess."

She didn't know how to help him with that. His ever-active mind had trouble resting, fueling the energy that kept him in a constant state of activity. That didn't change much when he slept, and she had a feeling it was a life-long issue for him. "Did your girlfriends have problems with your sleep patterns?"

He shook his head. "No. I usually left during the night so I wouldn't disturb them. You...You're the first woman in a long time that I've stayed with all night. And...I've let you into my bed."

"That's not usual?"

"No. I always go to her place. It's easier to leave then. I'm not comfortable in any bed other than mine."

She was quiet for about half a block, then she nodded and said, "I'll remember that."

He mulled that over until they were almost at the school. Then, very softly, he said, "Do you have any idea what it means?"

"What what means?"

He didn't answer, his attention drawn to the Gothic structure they were approaching. "Bobby?" she quietly encouraged.

She pulled in next to Logan's car as he answered, "That I let you stay. That you sleep in my bed."

He didn't wait for an answer, though, and she wondered if he meant it as a rhetorical question. She would have to give it some thought. She had to give him credit for that. He always made her think.

They entered the stone building to find Logan and Wheeler waiting for them. Logan quickly briefed them on the plan to watch the reactions of each group of students and staff for anything that seemed out of place. After introducing them to Father Gregory, the four detectives followed the priest into the bowels of the campus to deliver the news to the little community that one of their own had gone home to God.

* * *

><p>The reactions of the people in the St. Michael's community varied from shock and hysteria to vacant numbness. Many tears were shed, and there was anger, too. By the end of the day, the four exhausted detectives had only a short list of people they would look into the next day.<p>

They stood by their cars, looking over the list of a dozen names. Logan turned to Goren. "Any of 'em really jump out at you?"

"No. Not really. Everyone handles grief in their own way. I can explain how every one of these reactions can validate their responses." He shook his head slowly. "I don't think anyone we saw today knows anything about what happened to her."

Logan nodded his head slowly. "Yeah, I was afraid of that."

"Of what?" Wheeler asked.

"Of Goren feeling the same way I did about the entire afternoon."

"It was a waste of time," Eames said.

"Not entirely," Goren amended, resting his hand on her back as she moved away from Logan's car. "We did the right thing. Those people knew her and loved her. Regardless of our reason for being here, we offered some support to them in their grief. And we gave them reassurance that we'll find justice for them, for her."

"Did it help?" Logan asked.

Goren met his eyes, holding his gaze. They had not really needed extra help. What Logan did, he had done for him. With a slight tip of his head and the barest hint of a smile on his mouth, he said, "Thank you, Mike."

Logan's smile was a little more apparent. "Glad to do it, buddy. Wheeler and I are going to pay the boyfriend a visit. I'll stop by later to tell you how it went."

Goren patted his friend's back as he moved past him, walking around to the passenger side of the black Explorer. He looked over the roof of the vehicle at Logan. Neither of them said a word before they got into their respective cars, but volumes passed between them. The only person Goren had a deeper connection with was Eames.

Eames slid behind the wheel and watched the other car pull away. "They didn't need our help with that," she said.

"No, they didn't, but another set or two of eyes certainly didn't hurt."

He turned toward the window again. Eames could feel the emotion vibrating off him, the restless energy he was hard-pressed to contain. "Let's call it a day," she said softly.

He nodded without turning toward her. He was overwhelmed by the emotions of the afternoon. Fifteen hundred students, forty-odd teachers and two dozen administrative staff cried out with grief for the loss of a popular, beloved teacher, and Goren had been sensitive to every tear that was shed for the sister he never knew. His mind was painting a picture of a life cut short, and it was a beautiful, tragic image. With every revelation of Samantha's life, his grief became a little sharper, his anger a little more intense.

Eames felt her head spinning from the intensity of the afternoon, and she could only imagine how Goren felt. Her mind tumbled through the devastating events of the past couple of days, beginning with the call to the morgue, a visit that changed her partner's life.

As she turned out of traffic after crossing the bridge into Brooklyn, she reached out and gently rubbed her hand over his arm. "Why don't we grab a bite to eat and then just go to bed?"

She knew that if left to his own devices, he would turn to the bottle to console his grief. She didn't want that for him. She wanted him to turn to _her_, to need _her_. He wouldn't do that unless she offered, for fear of taking advantage. She had to let him know that it was okay for him to need her, that she wanted to be needed. He didn't answer except to turn his hand over and watch her hand slide into it. Closing his fingers around her hand, he went back to looking out the window.

She chose to interpret his actions as assent, so she drove to the little Italian place in his neighborhood that he favored. She watched him poke at his food, noticing that he wasn't as reticent with the wine. He was beginning to slide sideways, spinning recklessly, and she was the only one who could put on the brakes without devastating results. So she had them box up their uneaten dinners and she took him home, before he got out of control.

Once in his house, she put away the food and steered him from the kitchen, knowing he wasn't after food. He didn't fight her. Settling on the couch, she straddled his lap and finally, she felt him begin to relax. She undid his tie and slipped it from under his collar. Tenderly, she unbuttoned his shirt and ran her hands over his chest. He made a soft noise that drew her in for a gentle, loving kiss. Sliding her arms around his neck, she nestled against his chest. He put his arms around her and tightened them, snugging her against him. Pressing his temple against hers, he simply held her, slowly releasing the tension that had built up over the course of the day.

Her fingers lightly stroked his neck, and he seemed content. Eyes closed, he tucked his hand under her shirt and absently stroked her back. Neither of them moved for a very long time.

Then, something changed. His slow strokes became broader, gliding across her back, then up higher, down lower. His other hand gradually worked her shirt up until it was off. Her bra quickly followed and he began to kiss her, starting with her neck, then the curve of her jaw, her ear, her cheek. By the time he reached her mouth, his kisses were searing. He began to burn with a fever fueled by passion, driven by a hunger fueled by need. Tenderness turned to fire, and she felt the driving passion that had risen like a firestorm. Overtaken by a storm of emotion that quickly slid out of control, she surrendered to him, letting him take what he needed and giving him even more. A maelstrom of desperate need exploded like a storm surge against a rocky shoreline, rising quickly to a crescendo and then—calm.

She lay on his chest as her breathing and heart rate returned to normal, listening to the pounding of his heart and the rush of air into his lungs. His fingers trailed lazily over her back, raising goosebumps and making her smile. Her breath and her hair softly tickled his chest and he began to drift toward sleep, sated and spent.

Gradually, the waltz of his fingers over her back slowed until his hand came to rest on the small of her back. His heart quieted and his breathing evened out. An occasional soft snore rumbled through his chest. She felt relaxed and pleased with herself.

Slowly, she slid from under his arm, rising reluctantly from her place on his chest. Once the pressure was gone, he rolled onto his side, not waking. With a tender smile, she retrieved a blanket and covered him. Then she dressed. Just as she pulled on her shirt, a knock sounded through the quiet house. She hurried to the door and pulled it open, looking back into the living room. He stirred, but when the knock was not repeated, he settled without waking, much to her relief.

She pushed Logan out onto the front stoop. "I finally got him to sleep," she said softly.

"How'd you manage that?" he asked.

She gave him a look that elicited a laugh. "Never mind. I don't want the details."

"How did it go with the boyfriend?"

"It didn't. He wasn't at his place or at hers. Father Gregory told us he called in last week for her, said she had the flu. That raised all kinds of red flags in my mind. So we've got CSU going over both places with a fine toothed comb and an APB out on him. I also have an unmarked unit sitting on each apartment. That's all we can do until tomorrow."

"Did you see anything out of place?"

"I don't have the same kind of radar Bobby does, but something just didn't feel right. I can't put my finger on it, though. Maybe I'm just really jonsing to solve this one, you know. I want to do right by Sammy, but I really want it for him. I hate seeing him in so much pain."

Eames looked over her shoulder at the mostly closed door. "I know. So do I."

Turning back to face Logan, she grabbed his arm and squeezed. "Keep doing what you're doing. You'll get there. Just don't be too eager. Bobby's made that mistake and it came back on him big time. The best thing you can do for him is do it right and get the right guy."

"That's exactly what I'm going to do. You take care of him and I'll nail the bastard who killed Sammy."

"And when he wants a go at him in interrogation?"

Logan's mouth curled up into a smirk. "Then we let Ross be the bad guy and tell him no."

Eames laughed softly. "Go water your plant. Good night, Mike."

He took her hand and gave it a squeeze. "Good night, sweetheart."

She watched him bound off the stoop and walk to his car before she went back into the house and locked the door. She felt rested, not yet ready to turn in, so she sat in the recliner and picked up the remote. Turning the television on with the volume low, she looked for something to watch.

* * *

><p>The nightmare snuck up on him with a quick, deadly ferocity, distorting a pleasant dream into a torturous nightmare with frightening speed.<p>

She didn't immediately notice his restlessness. It began suddenly and by the time she noticed that he was distressed, he was in the full grip of the terror of his dream. Sweaty and panicked, he sat up with a shouted, "No!"

Breathing hard and trembling, he fought the panic as she jumped out of the chair and hurried to him. "Bobby," she softly called as she sat by him, reaching out to touch his shoulder.

He jumped away, whacking his knee hard against the coffee table, scrambling to escape an ill-defined danger. She called his name again, and this time, her voice broke through his panic. He stayed where he was, kneeling on the floor on the other side of the coffee table, and he let her come to him. This time, instead of lurching away, he pulled her to him, holding her tightly against his chest.

She squeezed him, listening to his ragged breathing and the hammering of his heart in his chest, his fear and panic still palpable. It took a very long time for him to calm, to finally waken fully, free of the grip of whatever had terrified him in his dream. By that time, the memory of it was long gone, and all he wanted to do was hold her. She coaxed him back onto the couch, wanting to hold him, but he wouldn't let her. He needed to be the one to hold her, to cradle her in his arms, stroking her hair and caressing her back. So she nestled into his embrace and let him hold her.

She rested her head against his chest, breathing in the lingering scent of his cologne mingled with sweat and the last remnant of fear from the nightmare that had jolted him awake with such sudden ferocity it had scared her as well.

"What can I do?" she whispered as she caressed his side. "How can I help you?"

He shook his head. "You can't," he answered, and that broke her heart.

She had never been witness to one of his nightmares before, and he'd scared her. She felt no physical threat to herself; her fear was for him. He somehow felt her fear and struggled to reassure her. "All you can do right now is just what you're doing," he said softly. "Just stay close and let me hold you."

"What do you do when you're alone?"

With slow tenderness, he slipped off her shirt, settling back as he drew her against him again, bare skin to bare skin. Finally, he began to relax and allow the final vestiges of his dream to fade away. "Sometimes I go out and walk, and I stay awake. Sometimes I stay in and drink until I can go back to sleep."

Now she understood the days when he dragged himself in looking roughshod and much worse for the wear. Although he took pains to be well-dressed and mostly well groomed, hiding his true self from the prying eyes of the world-at-large, she always saw the underlying fatigue, the haunted look in his eyes that left her deeply troubled.

She combed her fingers through his hair and he made a soft humming noise as he rested his head against her. Softly, she suggested, "How about we go in to the bedroom and see if we can't get some sleep tonight."

"I don't want to keep you up..." he started.

"You won't. Remember? I told you if there's a problem, I'll just sleep out here for a night or two."

"H-How long will you stay?" he asked tentatively.

"How long will you need me?"

Her question surprised him, but right then he felt secure, swathed a warm contentment he felt so rarely. "Always," he whispered honestly.

Any other time, he would have deferred to her wishes, deflecting his own needs in deference to hers. But the nightmare left him vulnerable, and she asked the right question at the right time to get an honest answer. "Okay," she replied. "We'll figure it out. Until then, I'll just stay."

Holding her as she stroked his hair and tickled the back of his neck, he began to feel drowsy again. She shifted herself so she could kiss him. "Come on, cowboy," she whispered, her tone light and playful. "Let's go to bed."

He would have done anything she asked at that point. The nightmare completely forgotten, he let her lead him to the bedroom, where he loved her again and fell asleep nestled in her embrace. She watched him sleep, gently caressing his hair. Her thoughts drifted to his anguish over the sister he never knew, and an odd thought struck her. She had never heard him say his sister's name. No matter how hard she tried, she could not recall his gentle voice saying Samantha's name. He always took pains to name their victims, to make certain they stayed real to everyone involved. But he struggled with Samantha. Somehow, she was still not completely real to him.

Snuggling deeper into his embrace, she felt warm and comfortable, and soon, she drifted to sleep as well. They both slept peacefully for the rest of the night.


	13. Navigating the Storm

The squad room was quiet for a weekday morning. Goren leaned back in his chair and looked at the time. Almost 11:30. Rising, he walked to the break room, trying not to limp. His knee was sore where he'd whacked it against the coffee table the night before. The coffee pot was nearly empty, so he set it up to brew a fresh pot. Leaning back against the table, he watched the coffee run into the carafe.

The morning started off pleasantly. He woke, feeling well-rested, which was a rarity for him. He'd rolled toward Eames, waking her gently, and he'd loved her. With her, it was _always_ love. He couldn't think of a better way to start the day, and he was in a good mood. The past week had his emotions shifting recklessly all over the place, leaving him unfocused and unsettled. A battle raged within him that he didn't know what to do with. On one hand, the discovery of a younger sister he would never get the chance to know tried to set off a depression of which he wanted no part. He lost himself in the bottle as he struggled to come to terms with the sudden loss of something wonderful he never knew existed and he honestly had no idea what to do with. On the other hand, there was the shift in his personal relationship with Eames, which left him wanting to feel nothing short of ecstatic. The love he'd always known was there had transformed into something utterly amazing and he was head over heels for her, which caught him entirely by surprise. Again, it was something with which he didn't know what to do. His grief over Samantha was offset by his new-found passion for Eames. He was confused and guilty and depressed and deliriously happy... In short, he was an emotional train wreck, which would be tragic for him but for one thing: he was in love. That love was what saved him.

He was drawn from his thoughts when Eames came into the room. "Did you get lost?" she asked.

He tipped his head and looked at her with longing. "I, uh, I was..." He took in a slow breath. "Coffee pot was empty," he said.

"You're kind of distracted."

"I'm not used to...feeling this good," he confessed.

Her cheeks colored and she smiled. "Does that have anything to do with me?"

"It has everything to do with you, Alex."

He shifted suddenly when his phone vibrated against his thigh. Pulling it out, he looked at the text message from Logan: _Got Farragut. Bringing him in._

He stared at the screen for a few moments before he put the phone away. "What is it?" Eames asked.

"They're bringing Farragut in."

"Good. I hope this will be the end of it."

"It will either be the end or just the beginning."

"Let's pray it's the end."

He had no comment for that. He moved to the coffee pot, which had finished brewing, and poured two cups, adding sugar to hers and cream to both. He handed her the cup he prepared for her.

She brushed his fingers with hers as she took the coffee, wanting very much to kiss him. The look in his eyes told her he felt the same way-but if he kissed her now, he wouldn't be able to stop it there. He bent toward her, almost involuntarily, but caught himself before it was too late. His eyes told her everything she needed to know about what he was feeling.

She was drawn to him and had to force herself to walk toward the door instead of into his arms. She stopped in the doorway, turning to meet his eyes. In her expression, he saw everything he was feeling mirrored back to him. He inclined his head slightly in a brief nod, and a small smile curved her lips. She disappeared from the doorway.

On the way back to his desk, he noticed a file sitting on Logan's desk that had not been there before. He grabbed it and sat down with it. Flipping it open, he examined the meager contents. Eames asked, "What's that?"

"Crime scene report."

"We've already been over that so often I can see it in my sleep."

"No. This is Logan's."

"Samantha's apartment?"

He nodded. "And Farragut's."

She rose and walked around to his desk. Gently, she took the file from his hands. "Come with me."

Confused, he looked up at her. "What...?"

"Just come," she encouraged, her voice soft, inviting.

Swallowing the lump in his throat, he followed her into an empty interview room. She closed the blinds to give them privacy, but before she could turn around, he was behind her, hands lightly gripping her upper arms. Not wanting to give her a chance to say anything that might disrupt his good mood, he leaned close, bringing his lips to her ear. "This past week has been very difficult for me, except for one thing, and that's you. I may not have the best timing in the world, but I know what I want, and I want you."

She closed her eyes as his voice reached every hidden corner of her body. The quiet emphasis he placed on the last three words sent a thrill up and down her spine. The stark reality of their location was the only thing that kept her from turning in his arms and surrendering to him.

His hands slid slowly up to her shoulders, and he gathered her hair, moving it off her neck. Softly, he kissed her neck. Moving slowly, he teased her earlobe with a light flick of his tongue, breathing softly into her ear.

She didn't want to move. She wanted to be engulfed by his hands, by his mouth, cocooned in a warm blanket of pleasure. His warm breath and moist tongue set her on fire. His hands settled on her waist, trembling with the effort it took to control himself, which reminded her of _why_ he had to keep control. She forced herself to remember where they were. She'd almost forgotten his penchant for risk-taking, his disdain for authority, both of which might be feeding his desire at the moment. And yet, seemingly of its own accord, her head rolled to one side, offering him easier access to her neck. She tried to say his name, but the word became caught in a soft moan as he nipped her ear and trailed a hot path down her neck with his tongue. Flames of need licked at her body, and she turned to face him. Too late, she realized how very close he was, and before she could react, his mouth was on hers, hungry, searching. Only barely, she kept a grip on herself, sliding her hands up his chest. Gently, she pushed, withdrawing from his kiss, and she managed to form a single word. "Stop," she said hoarsely, barely recognizing her voice.

Her one word, little more than a whisper, registered in his fevered mind. With a strength he did not realize he had, he withdrew, shaking from the effort. Collapsing into a chair, he buried his head in his arms, his breathing ragged, pulse pounding in his ears.

Folding her arms across her middle, eyes closed, she sought control, forcing herself to calm. Very slowly, she opened her eyes, and she watched him, fully aware of his struggle. When she finally recovered her full voice, she spoke, her tone gentle and soothing. "A couple of weeks after I started working vice, I came in from a long night, back to the squad room. Joe was waiting for me, like he sometimes did if we got off at the same time. I went to the locker room, took a fast shower and changed. When I got back to the squad room, he called me into a conference room. It was a room a lot like this one. He closed the blinds and he started...kissing me, and touching me...and...I didn't stop him. I also had no idea the door was not locked. We'd just finished putting ourselves back together when the door opened. My captain stood there, looking at the two of us, for what seemed like an eternity. Then he just closed the door. That evening, just before I went out on the streets for the night, he called me into his office. He looked at me with that same look and he said, 'Next time, lock the door.' That was all. He never mentioned it again."

Her story did what she had intended—it gave Goren a chance to recover his bearings and bring himself back under control. He watched her with an odd intensity she hadn't seen before. Quietly, he asked, "Did Joe realize he hadn't locked the door?"

"I asked him that the next morning. He knew."

Goren's mouth turned up into a small smile. "So he got off on the thrill of it, on the chance you might be discovered."

She nodded. "It wasn't a risk he took often, but when he did..."

When she trailed off, he nodded. "I know," he said softly. "The sex was incredible."

"That's an understatement." She studied him. "Did that ever happen to you?"

His expression took on an air of mystery. "A couple of times," he admitted.

"Were you ever discovered?"

"I had a few close calls, but no, we were never discovered."

"Do you still seek that thrill?"

He sighed and leaned back in his chair. They were both more relaxed now, fully in control once more. "Sometimes, but not here. I have no desire to be outed, Eames. Not with you. I won't take that risk. I can't. Not right now, any way."

"Someday?"

He heard the hope in her tone, and he couldn't turn her down completely. "Maybe."

They studied each other for several prolonged minutes before she broke the spell. "We should probably go," she said, motioning toward the door. "Back to work."

He rose from the chair and approached her once more, gently placing his hands on her shoulders. "I will always stop when you ask me to," he said, his voice carrying an urgency she didn't quite understand. "The day I don't, it's over."

"Bobby..."

He shook his head, unwilling to negotiate. "If I ever lose my respect for you, there will be nothing left between us." He tipped his head to the side, locking his gaze on hers. "I am a better man than the man who fathered me and the man who raised me. Let me have that."

She didn't look away. "Then you had better never lose that respect, because I can't promise I will ever be willing to let you go. Understand me?"

His face finally relaxed, losing some of its severity. "Yes. I understand."

She turned away from him, reaching for the doorknob, but he stopped her. "Why did you ask me to come in here? I doubt you were looking for a quickie."

She choked back a laugh before regaining her composure. "No, I wasn't."

"Then what did you want?"

She paused, considering the reason she'd asked him to come with her. Finally, she asked, "Would you do something for me?"

"Of course."

"Say her name."

"What?"

"Say your sister's name."

He became uncomfortable, looking down at the floor. She moved closer, reaching out to grasp his hand. "Say it," she encouraged.

He looked at her hand as her fingers slid lightly along his arm. "I-I can't," he said, his voice strained. "Not, not yet."

"Until you do," she said with quiet urgency. "Until then, she's not going to be completely real to you."

His eyes strayed over her body and he flexed the fingers of his left hand. He met her eyes again, tightening his hand into a fist. "I know," he said gently. "I, uhm, I...I'll get there."

Reaching past her, he closed his hand on the doorknob. In the same fluid motion, he pressed his lips against hers, lingering for as long as it took him to turn the knob and open the door. He walked past her and returned to his desk.

She watched him cross the squad room, her emotions in a whirl. She'd always known he was very physical and very affectionate with those he cared about. Her relationship with him had always been so complicated. Ever since they had crossed the line and begun a physical relationship, things had gotten both simpler and more difficult. Of one thing, though, she was very certain: she loved him. She loved him _and_ she was in love with him.

He glanced up when she sat at her desk, opening his mouth to say something, but his attention was diverted when Logan and Wheeler got off the elevator with a young man in handcuffs between them. He watched them lead him to one of the interrogation rooms, but he made no move to get up. That young man might very well have murdered the sister he never knew, and his emotions were in a complex jumble over that.

Eames watched him closely before she got up, motioning for him to stay there, and went to see what was going on. Goren did as Eames asked and remained at his desk, unwilling to draw Ross' attention any more than he already had over the past week. He trusted Eames to find out what was going on and not to keep him in the dark. He also trusted Logan with the same faith. He returned his attention to the crime scene file and he tried to concentrate, without much success.

Logan and Wheeler were in the observation room, looking at the young man who sat stoically on the other side of the two-way glass. Logan looked at Eames when she joined them. "He lawyered up and didn't say another word."

"What does your gut say?" she asked.

He shook his head slowly. "I don't know. I really don't have a feel for him. I'd like to get Goren's take on him, but right now, I don't want him anywhere near this kid. Not until we know a little bit more." He folded his arms across his chest. "Maybe the crime scene guys found something useful."

"Don't count on it. Bobby's looking through the CSU reports now, and he hasn't had much reaction to what they found."

He looked at her. "And that means...?"

"I know," she conceded. Goren was very good at playing his cards close to his chest. "But lately..."

She trailed off, and he knew exactly what she meant. He was less guarded with her now than he'd ever been before. Logan stepped away from the glass. "Let me go ask what he thinks, at least about the two apartments."

He squeezed Eames' arm as he passed her, offering reassurance. Logan, she knew, would watch out for her partner while she kept his partner company. It was a trade-off that granted her a little bit of a reprieve, not that she asked for one. But she knew that with Logan, Goren was in good hands.

Logan walked up to Goren's desk and grabbed a chair, sitting beside him. "Eames said you've been looking at the crime scene reports. Find anything interesting?"

"Not really. They, uhm, they...found three sets of prints in both apartments. One belongs to her and another I'm sure is Farragut's, which makes sense if they were dating. I'd like to find out who owns that third set of prints. Nothing popped in the databases. There's really not much more here than that."

He ran his finger along the edge of the file folder, shifting in his chair. Logan recognized his restlessness. "What?" he asked, knowing Goren had something on his mind.

"I, uh, I...Do you think..." He paused, then said, "I'd like to see her apartment."

Logan didn't respond immediately. He couldn't see any reason to say no, even though Ross was likely to throw a fit if he consented. Of course, what the captain didn't know, he couldn't object to, could he? Looking around, he clapped a hand on Goren's shoulder. "Sure. What the hell. Come on, buddy."

They stopped at the observation room, where their partners watched Farragut through the glass. "Hey," Logan said. "We're gonna go grab a bite. You girls want to come along?"

Eames looked at her partner. Maybe time alone with Logan would do him some good. Without the complications of desire and attraction to muddy the waters, maybe Logan could help him to settle and regain his bearings. "No, thanks," she answered. "We'll wait for his lawyer."

Logan nodded, giving her a knowing look. She knew full well they were not going to lunch. She watched them leave, turning back to find Wheeler looking at her. "Do you think they're really going to lunch?" Wheeler asked, suspicious.

"Do you think they're not?"

Ross came into the room before Wheeler could answer. He looked back out into the squad room. "Where are your partners?"

"They went to grab lunch," Eames said. "Wheeler and I are waiting for Farragut's lawyer."

"Has he said anything?"

"One word," Wheeler replied. "'Lawyer.' Then he shut down. He hasn't so much as cleared his throat since."

The captain looked at Eames. "How is your partner holding up?"

"He's okay, captain."

Ross hesitated, then said, "Let me know if there is anything I can do."

"Thank you, sir."

"I want to know when his lawyer arrives."

Wheeler nodded. "Yes, sir."

The captain left the room and Wheeler looked at Eames. "Is he really okay?" she asked.

"He will be. We're helping him get through it."

"You and Goren are close, aren't you?"

_You have no idea_, she thought. "Yes, but we've also been partners for a long time."

Wheeler looked off into the interrogation room. "I'm not sure I want to be that close to Logan. He's still kind of a loose cannon."

"He and Goren are a lot alike. That's why they've bonded so closely. I'll tell you this, Wheeler. If you've got Mike Logan in your corner, half your battle is won."

She spoke the honest truth. As close as she was to her partner, she knew, beyond any doubt, that she needed Logan to help her keep him grounded through the hell he was experiencing. And for that, he had earned a special place in her heart.

She focused her attention on the young man in the interrogation room. He knew something, she was certain of that. But did he kill Sammy? That was what they were going to find out.


	14. Reconstructing A Life

Logan opened the door to Samantha's apartment and the two men went inside, each pulling on a pair of latex gloves. Slowly, Goren walked around the living room, pausing to check out the books in her bookcase. He examined each picture, each knick knack, each potted plant, trying to get a feel for the woman who lived there. Logan stood by, watching him look through her collection of movies, neatly arranged in the entertainment center. He moved from the movies to her desk, set in the corner. He looked through the folders and envelopes on the desk, through her lesson planner and her address book. Methodically, as though examining a crime scene on a case of his own, he looked through the desk drawers, cataloging everything in his mind.

Goren moved into the kitchen, looking in the refrigerator, the freezer, the pantry and each cupboard before moving down the hall, stopping to look in the hall closet and the linen closet, to the bedroom. He stood in the doorway, reluctant to violate the sanctuary of her bedroom. His own home was his sanctuary from the world, and within it, his bedroom was the sanctum sanctorum. He wondered if that was how she felt about her own bedroom.

"You okay?" Logan asked.

"I don't know," Goren muttered.

Slowly, he stepped into the room. In the drawer of her nightstand, he found a box of condoms and an assortment of sex toys for both genders. Her dresser contained neatly folded t-shirts and jeans, with socks and underwear neatly arranged in the top drawer. Several pairs of panties and bras were attractively lacy, and half a dozen teddies and other lingerie were tucked into the back of the drawer. He opened the closet. Two dozen pairs of shoes neatly lined the floor: running shoes, rock climbing shoes, slingbacks, flats, shoes for any occasion. Most of her suits and dresses were conservative and classy. Hanging in the back corner was an assortment of low-cut, sexy dresses. Glancing up at the shelf above her clothes, his interest was drawn to a dozen or so books. He made a soft, involuntary noise of surprise, and Logan stepped closer to look over his shoulder. He laughed softly. "Would you look at that. Our Sammy had, uh, well..."

Goren glared at him and he chose his descriptors carefully. "She had interests beyond the classroom," he finished diplomatically.

Several of the books were tales of erotica while the others included titles such as the _Kama Sutra_, _The Joy of Sex_, _Over the Edge: Achieving Orgasm,_ and _A Beginner's Guide to Mind-Blowing Sex_. Goren looked through a couple of the books, one of which had detailed notes written throughout.

Logan nudged him as they left the bedroom. "She's a lot like her big brother," he teased, trying to draw Goren from his funk.

Goren frowned darkly. "What makes you say that?"

"Well, she's a reader like you, with a lot of different interests. I get the impression she was smart. And she obviously has an active interest in sex."

Goren appreciated his use of the present tense, and his irritation faded. He felt a need to protect Samantha, and he had to consciously chase away that tendency. It was too late, and besides, Logan was the last person he needed to be defensive around. "I'm not sure it's such a great thing, being like me," he replied.

"Well, I am. From everything I've learned, I think she was a great kid, just like her big brother."

Goren's face relaxed and he gave Logan a brief, affectionate smile. He didn't have to agree with him to appreciate the sentiment. "Thanks, Mike."

He turned to leave the bedroom, and Logan gave his shoulder a quick squeeze. They went into the bathroom. Goren looked in the medicine cabinet and under the sink. He stopped beside the bathtub, picking up a bottle of bubble bath. Opening it, he passed it under his nose, and he almost dropped it. Logan grabbed it before it slid from his hand. Goren looked at him. "It was here," he said with a tremor in his voice. He cleared his throat and went on, his voice steadier, "She died here. That, uhm, that bubble bath...that was the scent of the water...from her lungs...where she was drowned."

Logan took a whiff and nodded at the familiar scent. "Did the crime scene guys take any samples from the drain?"

Goren just nodded and pushed past him. Logan followed him back to the living room. "If there was a struggle, someone cleaned up. Nothing seems out of place." Logan hesitated, watching his friend closely. "Do you have a better sense of her now?" he asked, knowing exactly why Goren had wanted to visit the apartment.

Slowly, Goren looked around the room again. He motioned at the pictures on the entertainment center and the bookcase. "She loved them, her parents, and, uh, and her boyfriend."

"The same guy we have in custody for killing her?"

"Do you think he did it?"

Logan sighed. "I don't know. But I do think he knows more than he's telling."

"What did he tell you?"

"'Lawyer.'"

Goren cocked his head. "That's it?"

"That's it."

"Okay, then. What did he _tell_ you?"

As they left the apartment, Logan considered his friend's question. "I don't know. He acted guilty, but not guilty enough, you know. If he cared about her and he killed her, I wasn't getting it, but something's up with him."

He turned to lock the door as Goren walked to the car. On the way back to the squad room, they stopped for sandwiches. Although he wasn't hungry, Goren preferred to force a sandwich down to keep the lump in his gut company rather than lie to his partner. They'd said they were going for lunch, so they got lunch. After they ate, they returned to the squad room.

* * *

><p>Goren sat down at his desk and looked at his partner. "How was lunch?" she asked.<p>

"It was okay."

"What did you have?"

"A pastrami sandwich. Did you eat?"

She nodded. "Wheeler and I went down to the cafeteria. They had spaghetti today." She watched him for a moment as he sorted restlessly through the items on his desk, the way he often trolled around when they questioned suspects in their homes, before she asked, "Did it help?"

He raised his eyes to look at her without moving his head. "Did what help?"

"Seeing her apartment."

He looked sharply toward Logan. "How did you..."

"Relax. Logan doesn't betray your secrets. I just know you. I watched you look through the file and the photos from the apartments. I know you want to get a better sense of who she was, and I don't blame you. I would want the same thing."

He looked around. "Can we go someplace else to talk about this?"

She understood his need to be private with his life. Rising, she walked with him back to the same interview room they'd been in earlier. Sitting quietly, she watched him pace and wondered if she should have chosen a larger room. She'd seen his restlessness increase over the course of the day, and she hoped that talking through it with her would help him to settle.

"Go ahead," she said. "Tell me about Sammy."

He started visibly when she used Sammy's name. She'd seen a similar reaction in him every time Logan used her name. Hearing them refer to her by name was almost as profound as it would be if he said it, which he hadn't, not yet. He wasn't even at the point yet where he could _think_ her name. Right now, he was barely able to identify her as _sister_, though he was past the point of thinking about her only as _victim_.

He moistened his lips and rubbed the back of his neck, as he did when he was agitated. But it wasn't agitation, Eames knew. It was something more, something vague and indefinable, but real. He needed to talk, and she suddenly wished Logan was there, since he'd probably already been through this with him. "Go on," she encouraged gently. "Tell me what you found out."

Just like any other case, only this one wasn't like any other case. This one was personal. In his mind, he entered the apartment again. "It was tidy, everything in its place. If there was a struggle..."

"Don't look at it like a crime scene, Bobby. Don't tell me about the crime. Tell me about the girl. Who was she? What was she like? Tell me what you found out about her, about Sammy."

She was worried. He was on the verge of coming apart; she could see it. They were not in a place where they should do this, she realized. She stood suddenly. "Come on, Bobby. We're done for the day."

"What? But..."

"We have to do this but not here." She waved a hand toward the windows looking over the squad room. "Not in front of prying eyes. Let's go."

He followed her out of the room to find Logan standing by Goren's desk. "Everything okay?" he asked.

Goren briefly shook his head as he cleared his desk, putting away his files and gathering his binder. Eames met Logan's eyes. He said, "We're done with Farragut. He's staying in holding until they arraign him on Monday."

"Did you get anything more from him?" Eames asked.

"Not a word. I can't even tell you what his voice sounds like. I've never seen a suspect clam up so tight. I couldn't get a rise out of him, no matter what I said about him or even about Sammy."

Goren tensed suddenly, his left hand clenched into a fist. Logan noticed immediately and he raised a hand. "You know we gotta do it, buddy. Catch him off guard. I don't believe a word of what I said to him, except maybe that he did it. Even that I'm not sure of. Come on. Calm down."

Everything was catching up with Goren in a big way; they both could see it. For the first time, Logan questioned his decision to let Goren see Sammy's home. He motioned to Wheeler. "See you Monday, Wheeler."

She waved back, already on her way to the elevators. Logan looked back at Eames, who nodded at him. She absolutely wanted him there when Goren talked about Sammy. She had an uncomfortable feeling it was going to be a disaster.

* * *

><p>Logan rode along with them in the back seat of Eames' car, not liking the unnatural silence of the ride. Once they went into the house, Goren disappeared into the bedroom. Logan looked at Eames. "What's wrong with him?"<p>

"I'm not sure."

"Was I wrong, Alex? He wanted to see her home, to maybe get a better sense of who she was. The sense that I got was that she was a lot like him. Seemed she was really smart, well read..."

He stopped when Goren came out of the bedroom, dressed in jeans and a plain black t-shirt. Eames felt a jolt of desire which must have shown on her face because he stopped to look at her. After a pause, he went into the kitchen, coming back out with a beer. That reassured her. If he was deeply disturbed, he would have had a glass of scotch in one hand and the bottle in the other. He motioned toward the kitchen. "Help yourself," he offered.

"I'm good for now," Logan replied.

Eames approached him. "What are you feeling?" she asked.

He shook his head slowly. "I don't know," he answered.

Logan sat on the couch and waited. This had all the earmarks of turning into a really bad time for Goren. It was up to him and Eames to see that it he would be okay. He sat back and watched his restless friend as Goren began to pace.

Eames remained standing near the bookcase, also watching him. He was turning inward, and she couldn't let him go. "Bobby," she said softly. "Please. Tell me what you saw, what you found out about her."

He stopped moving when she spoke, turning his thoughts back to the apartment. He tried not to view it as a crime scene, but it was difficult. A crime had taken place there. A life had been taken, a life he wanted to know, but never would except in the past. "It was neat," he said in a faraway tone. "She kept it tidy."

Eames looked around the neat apartment. She had never seen anything out of place there either. "What else?" she encouraged softly.

"The living room has a couple of bookcases. She liked Shakespeare and Milton. There were books on psychology, education, history. The collected works of Mark Twain and C.S. Lewis. She had contemporary works, fiction by Patterson, Koontz, Grisham. Her history books were arranged by era in one bookcase, from exploration and colonization through the present. She had books on Native American cultures, on different religions, on terrorism." He paced slowly as he remembered, absently rubbing the back of his neck. "Her lesson planner was on her desk. She was working on it the day she died. Bills, with checks already written and ready to be sent off. A letter from her mother. There were knick knacks around the room, mostly figures of cats and horses, a Hummel of a sweet little girl holding a bird in her hands. On the entertainment center she had pictures of her parents and of Farragut. On a small shelf between the bookcases, she had two pictures of her with Farragut, and one of them with another man. All smiling, all happy. She...she had a good life."

Eames noted the tone of longing in his voice. Longing and relief. She watched him with concern, but remained quiet. "They did the right thing," he said softly. "I...I couldn't have given her what the Fullertons did. I couldn't have given her a happy life."

"Bobby, you don't know..."

"Yes, Eames. I know." He waved off her protest. "She ate right. There was no junk food in the refrigerator or the pantry, except for a half gallon of chocolate ice cream in the freezer. She was active, a runner and a rock climber."

He walked to his recliner and sat heavily, taking a deep drink from his beer bottle. He set it on the coffee table. "She liked sex. A lot. She had lingerie, an assortment of sex toys, and books—the _Kama Sutra_, several books on making sex better, erotic fiction. She made a lot of notations in one of the books. Things he liked, things she liked...details...Uh, sh-she liked soft porn." He trailed off, looking at the floor. "She subscribed to Cosmo, to a couple of history magazines and to Smithsonian."

Logan and Eames watched him finish off the beer. "She...She liked to look good and she liked to feel good, but there was no evidence of drugs, in her home or in her body. She seemed to be...well-adjusted."

He looked at Logan, who nodded and said, "She paid all her bills on time, and had no record with us, not so much as a parking ticket. Everyone at St. Michael's loved her. You saw that when we were there. It's our job to look for dirt, but she was squeaky clean. We can't find anyone with any motive to kill her. I don't know why she's dead."

"Something got out of hand," Goren said.

"Sex maybe?" Eames offered cautiously.

Logan shook his head. "There was no evidence she had sex before she died."

"Maybe it didn't get far enough to leave a trace."

"Erotic asphyxiation gone wrong?" Logan suggested.

Eames shrugged and looked back at Goren. He had tuned them out. She walked over to him and touched his arm. "Bobby?"

He forced himself from his thoughts, back to her. "I have a better sense of who she was," he said. "I know the kind of life she led as an adult. She was responsible, but she was her own person, a free spirit. I think...I would have liked her."

Eames knelt down in front of him, folding her hands around his. No one else could have constructed a life so completely from the few clues left behind in her apartment. He looked into her eyes, allowing her to draw him out completely, away from the prison of dark thoughts where he so often found himself. He leaned closer, and she met him halfway, kissing him softly.

She drew back, seeking his emotions in his eyes. She saw pain, but she also saw love. He was letting her in, letting her help him. He was going to allow himself to be all right.

She moved back when he got up, and he took her hand, leading her back to the bedroom. Logan smiled. The situation was emotionally intense and complicated, but Goren was reaching out. For the first time, he was seeking the help he needed to maintain an even keel.

He got up and went into the kitchen, fixing himself a sandwich and grabbing a beer. He drank a second and a third beer. Tomorrow was going to be another wringer of a day, with the trip to Connecticut to meet Sammy's mother. He dozed off watching a ball game and trying not to dread the coming day too much.


	15. Remembering Sammy

Logan pulled the car up to the suburban home of Kyle and Riley Fullerton and parked. "Here we are kids," he said. "Ready to make nice with the natives?"

They got out of the car, and Goren looked across the well-manicured lawn to the Tudor-style home beyond it. This was the home that saw his sister grow to adulthood, the home that harbored her safely from the world under the protective eyes of the parents who had loved her. He had no idea what that was like, but he was glad that she had.

He walked around the car to join Eames and Logan on the sidewalk that passed by the house. "You okay?" Logan asked.

He nodded curtly, fooling neither of them. "Let's get this over with," he muttered.

They proceeded up the walk, Logan taking the lead. He rang the bell, and they did not have long to wait before Riley Fullerton opened the door. She was dressed in a simple, conservative black dress and black pumps. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail and she wore a light application of makeup that accentuated her features, but she was still cloaked in a mantle of grief. That was something she could not hide. "Detective Logan, it's nice to see you again. Thank you for coming."

"Hello, Mrs. Fullerton." He shook her hand and stepped aside. "Detectives Eames and Goren," he introduced.

Riley shook Eames hand with a pleasant smile, but when she turned to Goren, she went very still. Both hands rose to cover her mouth and her eyes filled with fresh tears. Slowly, she reached one hand toward his face, stopping short of touching him. He forced himself not to react to the hand that reached for him. After an uncomfortable minute, Riley seemed to recover a little. "Forgive me," she said. "You just...my Sammy had your eyes, detective. Your eyes and your mouth. I...I didn't expect that." She moved back, away from him, out of the doorway. "Please, come in. Make yourselves comfortable."

She showed the into the living room. "May I get you coffee?"

When the three detectives nodded, she left the room. Eames sat on one side of the cream-colored sectional soft while Logan sat in a matching overstuffed armchair across from her. Goren stood by the fireplace, looking at the pictures that adorned the mantel above it. He continued to wander about the room, studying the pictures, the books, the paintings on the walls, while Logan and Eames watched him.

Riley returned to the room with a tray bearing a coffee pot and four cups. "Kyle will be joining us shortly. He's running a little late because it took longer than he expected at the store."

Goren sat beside Eames on the couch as Riley poured coffee for each of them. She looked at Goren. "I saw you looking at the pictures. Isn't she beautiful?"

"Yes," he answered.

Sitting on an adjoining section of the couch, Riley held her coffee cup on her lap and looked directly at him. "Is there anything I can tell you? Anything about Sammy you would like to know?"

A thousand questions raced through his mind, but he was uncomfortable asking any of them. He still did not feel it was his place to intrude on this family's grief. His most pressing questions could be adequately answered by the pictures that graced the room. Eames leaned forward and said, "Mrs. Fullerton, we are very sorry for your loss. Right now, the only thing my partner needs to know is that Sammy was happy."

"Oh, my, yes. She was always happy, always smiling and laughing. The room just seemed to light up when Sammy came into it. She was bright and smart and funny." She set down her coffee cup, untouched, and rose to her feet. Holding out her hand to Goren, she said, "Come with me, please, detective."

Goren glanced at Logan, then looked at Eames before getting up and letting Riley take his hand. As she led him from the room, he looked over his shoulder at Eames again. Eames looked at Logan, who said, "Is it my imagination or did he look like a puppy being taken to the room at the end of the hall?"

Eames smiled. "He doesn't know what to do right now. What do you make of her?"

"She's certainly more together than she was the other day."

"You can still see her grief. It's a battle for her to maintain her composure."

"She almost lost it when she saw him."

Eames nodded. "Look at her pictures, Mike. She looked a lot like him. I mean, you can tell he and Frank are brothers, but in some of these pictures, Sammy could be his twin."

Logan took a drink of his coffee. "I can't imagine what he's thinking, what he's feeling, right now."

Eames shook her head. "Neither can I."

* * *

><p>Riley led Goren up the stairs and down the hall to a closed door. Reverently, she turned the knob and opened it. "This is Sammy's room," she said. "Please, look around. Get to know her. She was almost three when we moved into this house. She was 23 when she moved to the city for good, to teach at St. Michael's, after she graduated from college. She was still in the process of moving her things to her apartment, but this room...this room is where she lived most of her life. No secrets, detective. You may look at anything you wish. Take your time."<p>

She left the room, closing the door behind her.

Goren wasn't sure what to make of Riley's offer, but he looked around the room from where he stood. He couldn't help himself. It was immaculately clean. The walls were painted a pale yellow with blue trim. The full sized bed in the center of the room was made, adorned by a yellow and blue plaid comforter. Three stuffed animals sat in front of the pillow: a giraffe, an elephant and a tiger. In front of them was a strip of white cloth, about six inches wide and eighteen inches long. Embroidered on the cloth were the words 'best friends.

Pictures of African animals decorated the walls along with objects of African art. He moved to the bookcase in the corner. Most of the books were psychology, history and education textbooks. Sitting on top of the bookcase, beside a large elephant carved from ebony, was a stack of three large photo albums. The cover of the album on top of the stack was adorned with a 5 x 7 picture of a rhinoceros. Below the picture was the name "Whitey." In larger print above the photo was the title "Africa" and below it was "2003" and "volume 1." Paging through the album, he discovered pictures with captions that told a story the began in June 2003, just after her 21st birthday. The first picture was taken at JFK airport, and he was surprised to see Daniel Farragut in the picture with her. They looked very happy. Obviously, he had gone to Africa with her. The last photo of the trip—also of the couple—was dated March 23, 2004, taken at the same spot in the airport. The large album told the story of an African odyssey Sammy and Dan had taken to Kenya and Tanzania, a graduation gift from her parents.

After looking through the albums, he replaced them just as they had been. He continued to look, in dresser drawers, through her desk drawers, immersing himself in the personality of the girl who had lived here. Then, he opened the closet door. Half a dozen pairs of well-worn shoes lined the floor beneath a dozen dresses, shirts and skirts. Up on the shelf, he found several cardboard storage boxes, each labeled with a number, one through four. Taking down the first box, he opened it to find an assortment of composition books and bound journals. Removing the first book, a black-and-white composition book, he looked at the dates on the front, written in black marker: _September, 1990 – February 1991_. Opening the book, he read the first entry, written in the scrawl of an eight-year-old child:

_September 17, 1990_

_Mrs. Franklin is making us keep a journal all year! That's just kinda dumb. We have to write something at least every three days. I don't know what I'll write, but I guess I'll have to think of something. We're gonna be graded on it, so I guess I gotta do it. This is dumb, Mrs. Franklin!_

He smiled and looked up at the other three boxes. Apparently, it was not so dumb, after all. That one teacher's project had inspired her to continue journaling her life. Those four boxes contained the mother lode, the pearl of great price. His sister's life was contained in those journals, written in her own hand. No one could tell her life better than she could, in her own words.

As he reverently placed the first journal back in its box, the door opened and Riley came back into the room. She looked at the box, then gave him a soft smile. "You found her journals. She's been keeping them since she was 8. I never had the courage to read them, and now, I never will. I just...I want to remember Sammy as she was to me, my Sammy. I don't want anything to taint those memories. I know she wasn't perfect, but I want to keep the memory of what she was to me untarnished. Does that make sense?"

"Yes," he answered. "It makes perfect sense."

He glanced at the boxes, not sure how to ask this grieving mother if he could borrow the journals, to learn for himself just who his sister was. Riley saw his uncertain glance, and she smiled sadly. "I want you to have them," she said gently. "Take them with you and get to know Sammy. All they will do here is sit on that shelf. You will cherish them and, through them, come to cherish Sammy."

He didn't know what to say. "I...uhm..."

She touched his arm. "Don't thank me. I'm glad to do this for you. We had Sammy for twenty-five wonderful years. You were cheated of the chance to get to know her. Take them with my blessing. All I ask in return is that you find out what happened to her, that you get the person who took her from us."

He nodded. "We will, Mrs. Fullerton. We'll find him."

"Lunch is ready. That's why I came back in here. Kyle can help you carry the boxes to your car after we eat."

"Thank you."

She smiled but there was deep sorrow in her eyes. "Detective Logan said you are a good man, and I see kindness in your eyes. You never met Sammy, but you grieve for her, don't you?"

He nodded, but was unable to speak around the lump that had formed in his throat. She leaned over and kissed his cheek. "Come on. Kyle made a wonderful lunch."

She left the room first, and he stopped in the doorway, looking back into the room, his grief for his sister growing more real by the moment. Perhaps it was too soon for this meeting, but there was no undoing it now. Sadly, he pulled the door closed and followed Riley downstairs.

Kyle had prepared a succulent, medium rare tenderloin steak for each of them, with garlic mashed potatoes, broccoli and a fresh garden salad with produce directly from his garden, which was at the end of its season.

The delicious meal was accompanied by quiet conversation as Kyle and Riley talked about their daughter, answering the quiet questions posed to them by Logan and Eames. Goren sat between Eames and Riley, listening intently, but saying little. The image of Sammy as a happy child and a kind, well-adjusted adult remained untainted.

They thought very highly of Dan Farragut, too. He treated her like a princess and, to their eyes, adored her. He was financially stable, even at such an early stage of his career, and they hoped he was going to marry their girl. He was as devoted to his younger brother as he was to Sammy, and they felt that their daughter was fortunate to have him share her life. When questioned further about the brother, all they could tell them was that he had some kind of disability and that Dan had watched out for him since they were boys. He was a doting brother, and they just knew he would be a wonderful family man. None of the detectives had the heart to tell them they had arrested Dan in connection with Sammy's murder.

After the meal, the detectives helped with the clean-up and thanked the couple for their hospitality. Riley directed Kyle to help Logan and Goren carry the boxes from Sammy's closet out to Logan's car. Kyle agreed with her decision to give the journals to Sammy's brother. There was no better way for him to get to know her than through her own words.

Once the boxes were safely stowed in the trunk, Riley asked Goren for his address. He took one of his cards from his wallet and wrote his address and phone number on the back, handing it to her. She hugged him and spoke softly into his ear. "Enjoy getting to know her, detective, and thank you for letting us talk about her. This was a big help for me, more than I ever thought it would be. I hope we helped you, too."

"Thank you for the journals, Mrs. Fullerton. I appreciate your generosity."

She gave his cheek a kiss and moved away, stepping into her husband's protective embrace. Always she knew Kyle would protect her. Even this luncheon get-together had been arranged to help her, at her therapist's suggestion, and he had been right.

They watched the car pull away from the curb and drive away before they returned to their house.

Eames had climbed into the back seat with Goren when they got back into the car. She sensed he was unsettled and she wanted to help him. Once they were on the highway headed back to the city, Logan looked in the rearview mirror and asked, "What's in those boxes?"

"She began keeping a journal when she was eight. Those are her journals."

"All four boxes?"

"Yes, all four boxes."

"And she just gave them to you?"

"Yes. She doesn't want to read them. She wants to remember her daughter as she was in her mind. Reading the journals might change that, and she doesn't want to risk it."

"I understand that," Eames said. "And I think it was very generous of her to give them to you."

After changing lanes to pass a slower car, Logan said, "She was a different lady than the one we visited the other day."

"She's had time to adjust," Goren said. "And to see her therapist."

Eames moved closer to him. "How do you feel?"

"I...I'm not sure. I feel reassured about her life. They loved her, and I think she had a good life, better than one I could have given her."

"Don't sell yourself short," Eames said softly.

"After she graduated from college, they sent her to Africa for nine months."

Logan glanced in the mirror again. "Money isn't everything, man. The bottom line is that either way, she would have been loved. That's what matters in the long run, not the size of your checkbook."

Goren leaned back and closed his eyes, unwilling to argue with them. Eames reached out and gently played with his hair. Some of his tension slid away and he shifted toward her, pulling her into a kiss. Tenderly framing her face with his hands, he deepened the kiss, seeking reassurance through intimate contact. He desperately needed some kind of affirmation of love from her, something undeniable, and she let him have what he needed. Neither of them gave a second though to the driver; their trust in him was complete.

Logan peeked in the mirror and smiled. In the end, love always won out.


	16. A Stunning Revelation

Logan drove them to Goren's apartment and they carried the four boxes into the house. Goren set three of them on the floor of his closet, in the corner opposite his shoes, beneath the few dresses and suits of Eames' that had somehow begun to accumulate beside his suits.

The other box, the one labeled with the number one, he set on the floor by the reading lamp next to the recliner in the living room. Removing the very first journal, the beginning of the story of his sister's life, he laid it reverently on the closed box. On one knee beside the chair, he stared at the journal.

Eames watched him, but he made no move to stand. Glancing at Logan, who shrugged, she stepped up behind Goren, placing her hands on his shoulders. Tenderly, she stroked his neck with her thumbs.

Closing his eyes, he tipped his head forward a little, encouraging her to continue, which she did. She had never know a man who responded so passionately to physical stimulation, especially on his neck and throat. The area between his jaw and his shoulders seemed tied directly into his groin, and she loved taking advantage of that weakness. He had so few of them.

But was it a weakness? No, she decided. She couldn't call it a weakness. Nothing that led to the intimacy they shared was in any way a weakness. It was more a vulnerability, a chink in his armor that openly welcomed exploitation, but only by her. Gradually, and with difficulty, he was opening himself to her. She had fallen in love with the guarded version of the man, knowing there was more beneath the surface that deserved attention. What she was finding, though, was that she had only been privvy to the tip of the iceberg. There was so much more to him that he kept well-hidden from the world, out of necessity, she realized. If he didn't hide so much of himself from the world, the world would destroy him, completely and utterly. Falling deeper and deeper under his spell, she would go to any lengths to protect him. That she couldn't protect him from everything was the only grief she found in loving him.

He reached back and closed his hand around her calf. He had yet to find all of her hot zones, and he was damn close to one he didn't know right then, but he didn't seem to be in the mood for exploration. She stepped back, moving around to sit lightly on his leg. She placed her arm around his neck and tousled his hair affectionately. She was not the most physically demonstrative person, something Joe often complained about, but with Goren, it was so hard not to reach out to him and respond to his physical nature. "Everything okay?" she asked.

"Yes and no. But mostly yes, I think."

"That's a definitive answer."

"It's the best one I have."

Logan sat down on the couch and said, "I think it's a good answer. If you said you were fine, we'd both know you were lying. But you don't seem poised on the edge of catastrophe, either."

Goren nodded, lightly stroking Eames' bare back where her shirt rode up from the waistband of her pants. "I owe that to both of you. I have no idea where I'd be if it weren't for the two of you."

"I do," Logan answered. "And I think you do, too. Personally, I prefer to prevent an epic disaster rather than clean up after one."

Goren rested his forehead against the side of his partner's head. "You've done well, keeping me back from the edge," he said softly, brushing his lips lightly over her ear.

"You let us," Eames said, not quite successful at keeping a quiver from her voice. They were both still keyed up from the ride back to the city.

He kissed her temple and she got up so he could. He looked at Logan. "Did anyone find a journal when they went through her apartment?"

Logan shook his head. "No, not that I'm aware of."

"Can we...go back and check?"

Logan hesitated. "Now?"

"There's no time like the present."

"A journal could be considered evidence."

"You're the investigating officer. You can put it into evidence after I take a look at it. It will come to me anyway. She's kept a journal since she was 8. The last one in the last box ended in March. There has to be one at her apartment."

Logan looked at Eames, who shrugged. "All right," he said. "But you owe me."

"Deal."

* * *

><p>The three detectives drove to Samantha's apartment. Logan opened the door and they slipped in under the crime scene tape, as he and Goren had done the previous afternoon. Goren looked at his partner. "Where would she have kept it?"<p>

"You're asking me?"

"I have no idea where a woman would keep her journal."

"Did you check her night stand?"

"It wasn't in there."

"That's where the sex toys were," Logan added, earning himself a look from Goren.

"Mattress," Eames said. "Check between her mattress and her box spring."

Gorenstopped in the middle of the room and let his gaze wander. "Mike...when this is all over...her parents will be the ones to clean out her things."

"Yeah. So?"

"You saw...what she has, and you know what they think of her. Her mom doesn't want to read her journals because they might change the image she has of her daughter. What do you think those things in the bedroom will do when she finds them?"

"Bobby...the journal is one thing..."

"CSU has already been through here. You've made an arrest. It's going to be released soon. We can't..._I_ can't...You can catalogue it all, just in case. I'm not trying to hide anything. I just want to protect them. If something comes up, you and Wheeler will be the ones called in on it. Please. I couldn't protect her. Let me protect the memories of her that her parents have."

"You bend the rules more than anyone I know. Okay, fine. There's a box in the kitchen. I'll grab the porn from her DVD collection."

"Thank you."

"Now you _really_ owe me. Vacation in Hawaii owe me."

Goren patted his arm and went into the kitchen for the box. Logan walked to the entertainment center and began looking through the videos, muttering under his breath. Once Goren went into the bedroom, Eames wandered around the living room. He looked over at her. "Tell me I'm doing the right thing."

"You are. I would let him do it, too."

"You sleep with him. You let him do a lot of things I never would."

"Keep it up, Logan. I just might shoot you."

He laughed as he set aside the soft porn movies that her parents didn't need to see. Eames looked through the titles of the books on their shelves. "Do you see any similarities?" Logan asked as she explored the room.

"You mean the books?"

"And how clean the place is. I didn't know that kind of stuff was genetic."

"From what I've seen of Sammy and know of Frank, I don't see anything of Frank in her."

"I guess he took more after William Goren than Frances," Mike postulated. "Maybe we'd be seeing him in her, too, if he hadn't become a junkie."

"I'll give you a maybe on that," she said. She would never be president of the Frank Goren Fan Club. "How did Bobby do here yesterday?"

"Pretty good," he said. "He just looked around, trying to get a feel for her. Now he's raiding the place."

She laughed quietly. Leaning over, she glanced at the books on the lowest shelf of the bookcase furthest from the door. She spotted a book on the far left of the shelf. About the size of the 'W' volume of the encyclopedia set she'd grown up with, the book had no title on the spine. Curious, she pulled it off the shelf. On the front cover was an image of the NYPD logo and a picture of a squad car. She flipped it open to the first page and almost dropped the book. "Oh, my God..."

Mike looked over at her. "What?"

"Mike...Look at this."

He walked over to her and looked over her shoulder. "What the hell..."

Slowly, Eames paged through the scrapbook. "She knew," she said, keeping her voice just above a whisper. "She found out she was adopted. She must have tracked down her birth family. She knew he was her brother."

"Do you think the Fullertons know?" he wondered, following her lead and speaking softly.

"I'll bet money she never told them. They would have said something." She continued turning the pages. "She might have told Farragut."

"Maybe, if she was close to him. But he's not talking to us, so we're not likely to find out."

"It looks like she went back through the archives of the newspapers and copied every article she could find that mentioned him."

She turned another page to find a photo of Goren, obviously taken from a distance. More photos followed, taken all over the city from varying distances, all obviously without his knowledge. Eames was in some of them, Logan in others. "Looks like someone had a stalker," Logan joked followed by a grunt when Eames elbowed him.

"He was her brother," she said. "It looks like she was trying to find out more about him."

"Can you blame her after finding out about her birth mother's history?" He pointed at a picture of him and Goren, seated at a bar. "That was taken back on St. Pat's, at Casey's." At her curious look, he tapped the glass on the bar in front of him. "Green beer."

She smiled and shook her head. "Do you think she was going to approach him about it?" he wondered.

"Maybe...once she found out more about him."

He rubbed his temple. "So what do we do with this? Do we tell him?"

"Not right now, we don't, but yes, we have to tell him."

"Oh, so we're gonna wait for the right time? And how do we recognize it when it comes along? Is there even any such thing as the right time?"

"I don't know, but we have to find one before he gets to the point in her journals when she found out she was adopted and started looking for him."

"I don't suppose there's a chance she didn't mention it, is there?"

She shook her head. "Not a chance in hell."

"Well, maybe you can tell him after sex."

She punched his shoulder. "_We_ are going to tell him, idiot, not _me_. I'm not walking into this one alone."

"So _we_ can tell him after sex."

"Logan, you are not getting involved in our sex life in any way, shape or form."

"I was almost part of it on the ride back from Connecticut," he teased.

Her face turned red and she gave his shoulder a shove. "Shut up, and tell me how we smuggle this out of here without him knowing about it."

With a sigh, he held out his hand. "Give it to me. I'll run it out to the car and stash it."

She placed the scrapbook in his hands. "Run fast because it's not going to take him long to find what he's looking for and pack up what he found."

"Okay, then, go stall him. Give me about five minutes."

She scowled. "Stall him how? He always knows when I'm trying to stall him."

"Yeah, but now you have a whole new arsenal to use."

"I'm not going to screw him at a crime scene, Logan."

"Maybe that's one of his fantasies," he joked, stepping away from her before she could smack him.

"Just go," she said impatiently.

Laughing softly, he trotted to the door and ducked under the tape. Shaking her head, she went down the hall to corner her partner in the bedroom.

When she entered the bedroom, he was sitting on the bed with the journal in his hands. Her heartbeat quickened. He was reading the damn thing. "Oh, you found it," she said.

He looked up. "What? Oh, yeah. It was under her mattress, just like you expected."

She relaxed. She hadn't mentioned him, at least not in her last few entries. He would be acting much differently if she had. Reaching out, she took the journal, closed it and set it on the bed, beside the box that was packed with lingerie, books and an assortment of sex toys, including a box of condoms. Stepping between his legs, she looped her arms around his neck and studied his face.

Setting his hands on her hips, he looked back at her. "Is something wrong?"

She shook her head. "No, nothing more than the usual."

She teased the hair at the nape of his neck. His eyes slid closed and his fingers tightened on her hips. She leaned in and kissed him, slipping her tongue past his lips to wrangle with his. He groaned deep in his throat, still worked up from the ride back from the Fullertons. One hand eased itself under her shirt and up her back. The other cradled her head as his mouth did things to hers that sent shivers throughout her body.

_God_, she thought as she made a soft noise into his mouth. He elevated kissing to an art form. Her mind went blank, forgetting everything, including the fact that they were in a victim's bedroom, his _sister's_ bedroom for the love of God, and Logan was—or would soon be back—in the next room.

Slowly, he eased back, breaking the kiss, his reluctance evident in every way. "L-Let's go home."

She nodded, kissing him again, but she knew he was right. There was no way he was going to take her in his sister's bedroom, crime scene or not, and she was grateful to him for his restraint. Obviously, she had none. When he broke the kiss a second time, she stepped away from him. He sat still for a moment, his breathing still a bit ragged, and he calmed himself.

He grabbed the journal and stood up, meeting her eyes once more. Her knees became weak at the heat she saw in his eyes. She turned away, crossing the room and wondering just when she had turned into a teen-aged boy who couldn't say no to sex.

Logan was back and he peeked in the box Goren carried as he added the DVDs to it. He pulled out the journal and leafed through it, quickly scanning the neat writing for any mention of Goren's name without lingering and raising Goren's suspicion. The first entry was March 13, the last one, written with only a couple of pages left in the book, just two days before she died. As he closed the journal and set it back in the box, he wondered how long he could stall and prevent Goren from reading it. Not long, he knew, so they were going to have to tell him soon.

* * *

><p>They stopped to pick up a couple of pizzas before they returned to Goren's apartment. Logan accepted Goren's invitation to crash on the couch and after they ate, Eames coaxed Goren back into the bedroom without the recent journal. Keeping the journal from Goren was going to be about as easy, and dangerous, as keeping a tiger off a fresh kill. He hoped that Eames could buy them some time tonight. He would come up with something tomorrow. Just what, he had no idea, but they'd better dream up some kind of plan pretty damn quick.<p>

Once he was sure they were well-occupied, Logan ran out to the car and brought the scrapbook inside. He retrieved the journal and searched through it for references to Goren. He found a couple, but although they were vague on details, the phrase 'meeting my brother' and ones much like it were sure to catch Goren's attention. So she had planned to approach him, and she seemed to be looking forward to it. Logan could not help wondering how that would have played out. Certainly better than the way he had found her. Frank would still be in hot water and Goren would still be angry with his mother for keeping Sammy a secret all these years, but Sammy would not be dead. He would have had a chance to know her, to make it up to her for not being in her life all those years. It would never occur to him to shift the blame for that onto the parties responsible. He would still feel guilty for not knowing. But it would have worked out for the best because Sammy would still be alive. For the first time, he had insight into the profound, impotent grief his friend must be handling. No wonder he tried swimming in a scotch bottle. It was hard for him, and Logan felt bad that there was nothing he could do to make it better.


	17. Grief

Logan was snoring on the couch when Goren came out of the bedroom. It was almost eleven o'clock, and he was restless. Not wanting to wake Eames, he intended to begin reading Sammy's journals, but he couldn't settle down. He watched Logan sleep for a minute before he grabbed his jacket and left the apartment.

* * *

><p>The squad room was empty when Goren arrived. The only one there besides Dan Farragut was the uniformed officer pulling the night shift to watch over him. He walked into the holding area with a sandwich and three cups of coffee. Nodding to the officer on duty, he handed him a cup of coffee. "I need to talk with him."<p>

The officer nodded. It wasn't his job to tell a squad detective he couldn't see the suspect in the squad's holding cell. "Want me to make myself scarce?" he asked, assigning a different definition to the term 'talk.'

Goren shook his head. "That won't be necessary. We're just going to talk."

Roused by the voices, Farragut sat up on the cot and rubbed his eyes. He squinted in Goren's direction as the detective stepped up to the bars and held out the sandwich. "I thought you might be hungry."

Farragut looked at the time. "It's midnight."

"Call it a midnight snack."

After a moment of hesitation, Farragut got off the cot and took the sandwich. "Thanks," he said, his tone guarded.

Goren nodded and gave him a cup of coffee. He leaned against the bars, watching the young man sit down and begin eating. "You pull the late shift?" Farragut asked, not recognizing Goren.

Goren shook his head. "No."

"So what are you doing here?"

"I wanted to talk to you."

"On the advice of my attorney, I've got nothing to say."

"Look, this isn't my case. I'm not here to interrogate you."

"Then why are you here?"

"I just came to talk."

"Maybe you should wait for my lawyer."

"This isn't about the case. It's...It's personal. I need to know...about...about...Sammy."

He had never spoken his sister's name before, and it didn't exactly roll off his tongue. At the sound of his voice saying her name, his chest constricted and his knees felt weak. His hands tightened on the cross bars. He felt restless and unsettled, but he tried to calm himself as he watched Farragut glare at him with suspicion.

"Why does it matter to you? You're just trying to trick me into admitting to something I didn't do."

Goren shook his head. "No. No trick. I just...I want to know...more about her."

"Why? So you can develop more empathy for her? So it will be easier to convict me?"

The detective shook his head again, trying to be patient. He understood Farragut's reluctance to talk and it would take a little work to get him past it. "I...I want to know...what she was like."

"What difference does it make now?" Farragut asked, unable to fully hide his grief. "It doesn't matter what she was like. She's gone."

"It matters to me. She...Sh-she was my sister."

Farragut studied him without reacting to his statement. "I'm not a chump, detective."

"I don't take you for one. Sammy was adopted, and my mother was her birth mother. I was in the army, stationed overseas, when she got pregnant, and she never told me. I never knew."

Farragut's arrogance melted into sympathy. "I'm very sorry that you never knew her. She was amazing. I was so lucky."

"Please, tell me about her."

Farragut took another couple of bites of his sandwich, washing them down with the coffee, as he considered what to say. The cop seemed to be sincere. "What's your name?"

"Goren. Robert Goren."

"Have you ever loved a woman, Detective Goren? I don't mean some passing infatuation or lustful encounter. I mean really, truly loved her...with every fiber of your being, with a love that makes the earth spin and keeps the stars in their orbits in the heavens. A woman who makes your life worth living, keeps your heart beating, and somehow makes sense of the universe."

Immediately, Goren's thoughts turned to Eames. "Yes."

Farragut could see in the man's eyes that he was being honest, that he did, or once had, loved a woman like that. "Then you have some idea of how I felt about Sammy. I didn't kill her. I...I loved her, with all my heart. If you take a look at the stuff they took from me when I was arrested, there's a little velvet box. We were going to go to dinner...the night she died. I was going to propose."

"Why keep the ring with you?"

"I..." He hung his head. "It's stupid."

"Tell me anyway."

"I didn't want to put it away, not yet. I didn't want to put _her_ away." He set his sandwich aside and walked to the bars opposite Goren. "I swear to you, I didn't kill Sammy."

Goren studied Farragut's face, and he saw grief and sincerity. "Why won't you talk to the detectives, then? They're trying to find justice for her."

The young man weighed his options. He had been treated with open hostility by the police until this point. Goren was the first cop to be civil to him. "Justice?" he said with derision. "What justice? They don't want to find the truth. They're trying to pin her death on me so they can say they solved the case. It's a numbers game, like ticket quotas."

Goren shook his head. "The detective in charge of the case, Logan, he's my friend. One of the few real friends I have. He's not conducting a witch hunt. He wants to find whoever killed her, not put an innocent man in jail. There's no justice for anyone in convicting the innocent."

"Forgive me if I don't believe you. I figure, as long as I keep my mouth shut, they can't convict me. There won't be any evidence because I didn't do it. But words...words can be twisted and misconstrued. Silence is my friend."

"I see your point, but have you considered that silence makes you seem guilty."

"Appearances won't convict me. I don't care what they _think_. I _know_ I didn't do it. I loved her; I cherished her. I couldn't even bear to argue with her. I never hurt her and I certainly didn't kill her."

Because of Eames, Goren understood, first hand, the kind of love Farragut described. "When did you see her last?"

Farragut looked at the floor, silent for a few minutes. "Where did they find her?"

Goren had the young man talking, which was a start. If he was going to get anything from Farragut, he would have to be willing to give as well.

"She was found near Gracie Mansion."

"Really?" Farragut was genuinely surprised, followed by anger, which he quickly suppressed, but not before Goren saw it.

Goren nodded. He didn't know what the anger meant, but he knew it was significant. His best tactic at the moment was to ease Farragut off his guard. He had not come to interrogate him about the murder, but if he could get Farragut talking, he would certainly take what he could get. Honestly, his only intent in coming to see Farragut was to talk about Sammy. He came in with no guarantee that the young man would talk to him, but he felt compelled to try. So far, Farragut had said more to him than to anyone else since his arrest. "We, uhm, we found her journal," Goren said.

Farragut watched him in silence before he said, "She was always writing in that stupid book. She'd never let me see what she wrote, either."

"It was private. Her private thoughts and feelings. No one violated that while she was alive, not even her parents."

"What do you know about her parents?"

"I had lunch with them this afternoon. Her mother gave me all her journals, so that I could get to know her through her own words." He paused. "But it's not the same. I'll never get to hear her voice or see her smile at me. I'll never hear her laugh. All I'll ever have is words on a page. I will never have any memories of my sister."

Farragut watched him intently. "I'm sorry," he said sincerely. "Her parents...How are they holding up?"

Goren shrugged. "It's hard."

"Yeah. It's hard. I can't imagine my life without her. It's going to be so..." He stopped suddenly, overwhelmed by grief. He swallowed a sob and turned away.

It was Goren's turn to watch him. Silently, he turned toward the uniformed officer and held out his hand. The officer hesitated for a second before taking the keys off his belt and dropping them in Goren's hand.

Goren unlocked the cell door and slid it open, slipping the keys into his pocket. Farragut had moved to the far side of the cell when Goren opened the door. He watched with apprehension as Goren sat at the foot of the cot. Tentatively, he sat down on the far side of the cot. Goren waited, and finally Farragut said, "It's going to be impossibly hard to adjust to a world without Sammy in it."

"Tell me about her," Goren encouraged. He very much wanted to see Sammy through Dan Farragut's eyes. "What was she like?"

"You never saw her for real, did you?"

"Only in the morgue."

Those words shook Farragut. "The m-morgue...that's so...so..._final_."

Goren nodded. "It is."

"Do you know how...it happened?"

"Do you?"

Farragut became guarded, and Goren was more convinced that Logan was right. He knew more than he was saying. Granted, he'd said a lot more to him than he had to anyone else, but Goren definitely got the feeling that Farragut knew more about Sammy's death than he was admitting. And his gut feelings were not often wrong. Farragut diverted the conversation away from death and back to Sammy's life. "So you know what she looked like."

"Yes, and I've seen pictures."

"You're used to dealing with death, aren't you, detective?"

"Yes, I am. I deal with it all the time in my work. And my mother...my mother died this past August. Cancer."

"I'm sorry for your loss." He paused. "Why did she give Sammy up?"

"I'm not sure it was entirely her decision. My mother was schizophrenic, and she couldn't care for her properly. So whether she gave the baby up or whether they took her, it was the right thing to do."

"How old were you when Sammy was born?"

"I was almost 21. My mother and my brother...they kept her a secret all these years."

"Why? Because you wouldn't have taken her if they told you?"

Goren shook his head. "No, because I would have taken her. That would have been a constant reminder to my mother of her...inadequacy. She made my brother swear not to tell me, and that was a promise that he kept."

He couldn't keep the bitterness from his tone, and Farragut picked up on it. "So how did you find out she was your sister?"

"She was unidentified when they found her. As a matter of routine, they ran her DNA in the system, and she popped as a partial match to me, indicating she was either my sibling or my child."

"And you figured it out...?"

"By investigating. I never had a child, not that I know about, so I started by asking my brother."

"And he cracked?"

"Something like that."

Goren had no idea why he was sharing so much information with Farragut, except that the young man's grief struck a chord within him. He might be hiding something, but his grief was genuine. He had loved Sammy very much.

Farragut shifted on the cot, moving a little closer. "I can't imagine how hard that must have been for you to find out, to discover you had a little sister only after she'd died."

Goren stared at the floor. No one could imagine his pain. It ran deep, opening fresh wounds in an already-ravaged soul. But he was fortunate in one regard. In Eames and Logan, he found salve for those wounds. They kept him from turning too far into his grief, bringing clarity and perspective to his life. But he still could not find it within himself to forgive his mother and his brother for keeping Sammy's existence from him. The more he learned about Sammy, the more bitter he became.

Farragut reached out and touched Goren's arm. When Goren looked at him, he smiled. "She wasn't perfect. She had quite a temper, and she cursed like a longshoreman when she was pissed. She couldn't throw a ball for anything. I teased her because she threw like a girl, but she sure could run fast. I never could outrun her. She was a perfectionist, and she hated to be wrong. She hated it even more when I was right." He laughed. "She was smart and she knew a lot about a lot of things. When something came up that she didn't know, she found out all about it."

Goren smiled sadly. "I, uhm, I'm the same way...only I can throw a ball."

Farragut laughed again, a genuine laugh. "She loved to laugh and she had a great sense of humor. She had a great laugh, too. It was contagious. You just couldn't be around Sammy and not be...happy."

Goren leaned forward, arms on his knees. "Did she like to teach?"

"Oh, God, she loved it. It was her true calling. She filled and enriched young minds, made them hunger for knowledge."

"Where did she go to college?"

"NYU. That was where we met. She was an education major with a concentration in history and psychology. Graduated with honors."

"What about you?"

"I held my own with a solid B average in business and finance. She always said she loved me but that my job would bore her to death. I'm an investment analyst on Wall Street."

"I saw her scrapbooks from Africa."

He smiled. "Detective, that was the best time of my life. Just me and Sammy. Nothing to worry about except each other. Well, and getting eaten by lions or mosquitoes. We were carefree and deliriously happy. It doesn't get any better than that."

Goren had never experienced what Farragut was describing, and he had no real frame of reference for it. "Did her parents approve?" he asked softly.

"Of me? Yes and no. Do any parents really approve of any man for their daughter? But they loved me because Sammy did."

"What about your parents?"

"My parents are dead. They were killed in an automobile accident about three months after Sammy and I got back from Africa. But they adored her. Everyone did."

Goren fixed his attention on Farragut as he asked, "And your brother?"

Farragut became suddenly uncomfortable and defensive. "What do you know about him?"

"Only what Sammy's parents told us. They said he's disabled and you take care of him."

"I...I'm really tired now, Detective Goren. I'd like to go back to bed."

Goren nodded. "Thanks for talking to me, Dan. I feel like I know her a little better now, and I appreciate that."

Standing, he walked to the cell door, pulling out the keys. Farragut called his name, and he turned to look at him. "Did you read her journal? The most recent one, I mean?"

Goren nodded. "Not yet. I just skimmed the last couple of entries."

"She must have mentioned him, so why are you asking me about him?"

"It's what I do."

Goren stepped out of the cell, closed and locked the door, and looked back Farragut. "You know what happened to her, Dan. You didn't kill her, but you know who did."

And so did he. All he was lacking were the details. Farragut stared at the wall, a tear rolling over his cheek. "For his 18th birthday last year, we got him a kitten. He adored that little thing, took it with him everywhere for three days. I found the poor thing dead on the fourth day. He loved it to death. He cuddled it and hugged it and, ultimately, he smothered it. He doesn't understand. He's got the mind of a four-year-old, but the physical strength of a linebacker. He honestly doesn't know how strong he is."

Goren leaned against the bars and softly asked, "What happened, Dan?"

Farragut's mouth twisted as he tried to control his emotions. Another tear escaped his right eye, and then his left. "He...He didn't mean to hurt her," he said as another tear rolled down his left cheek. "He didn't." Farragut clasped his hands together to keep them from shaking. "He honestly didn't mean to hurt her. He...he's just a child, really, and that's the problem." He tapped his temple. "He's four years old, with the size and strength of a full grown man." Tears continued to slide unchecked down his cheeks. "I was only gone for a half hour. He finished the milk, and I had to run out for more because he needs a cup of warm milk at bedtime. So I left him home with Sammy, like I had a hundred times before. He adored her, and she was so good with him."

"What did he do?"

"He's not quite as tall as you, and stockier, and Sammy was such a little thing. They were playing when I left to get the milk. When I got back..." The tears rolled freely now. "It- It was too late."

Through a mighty effort of will, Goren kept his emotions in check. "Do you know...how...what happened?"

He shook his head. "No, I don't know what happened. All Charlie could tell me was that Sammy was sleeping and he couldn't wake her up. She...She'd drawn a bath, because we were going out, and she was waiting until I got back to take it, so Charlie wouldn't be alone. Charlie thought that maybe the water would wake her up, so he put her in the tub. He didn't know to hold her head above the water. He didn't know. He didn't know."

Farragut was sobbing now, covering his face with his hands, and his grief was genuine and overwhelming. "Why didn't you call the police?" Goren asked, keeping his own emotions in check with difficulty.

"Because it was an accident, and I was trying to protect him, like I've always done. I was trying to be a good big brother."

"Who did you call?"

"I have a friend...Victor...We've been best friends since first grade. He, uhm, he knows people. So he had someone come over and take her so that no one would know what Charlie did."

Anger and grief battled with sympathy in Goren. "Do you know what they did?"

Farragut shook his head. "I was afraid to ask."

"They dumped her body, Dan. They just...left her there, near the mayor's home."

The grief-stricken young man covered his face with his hands, his shoulders heaving with the sobs that wracked his body. Goren stood by silently, watching him cry it out. Once Farragut was once more in control of himself, Goren asked, "What happened to Charlie? Was he born that way?"

He wiped his eyes. "When he...When he was born, the cord was wrapped around his neck a couple of times. His brain...was deprived of oxygen. He was never right. He, uhm, he still thinks Sammy is with the doctors, and he watches out the window, waiting for her to come home every night. He cries himself to sleep when she doesn't come back. She was so good, so patient, with him. I never, in a million years, thought he would ever do something she couldn't handle. I never imagined he would hurt her. It never even occurred to me." He swallowed hard. "He has a very simple mind, like a small child. He didn't mean to hurt her."

"Where is Charlie now?"

"I left him with friends, over in the East Village. He knows them. They've taken care of him for me before."

"And if you go to jail?"

"I...I never considered that...because I didn't kill her."

"But you covered it up, Dan, and that's still a crime. You were an accessory after the fact." He sighed. "You have to tell us where Charlie is."

Dan rushed to the door and wrapped his hands around the bars, struggling not to seem frantic. "Do you know what they'll do to a guy like him in prison, detective?"

"He won't go to jail. They'll have him evaluated and I'm sure he'll be declared unfit for trial due to mental disease or defect. He'll go to a psychiatric facility where they'll take care of him, and he won't hurt anyone else."

"He needs me. I can't...If they take me away from him...what will happen to him?"

"I, uhm, I can put in a word and have Charlie sent to a good place, a place I know, north of the city. My mother lived there for the last fifteen years of her life. They're good people. He'll be in good hands with them."

"How long will I have to spend in jail?"

"That's up to the DA." He placed his hand on Farragut's. "Go on and get some sleep. Detective Logan will be in in the morning and you can give him your statement."

Farragut placed his other hand over Goren's. "I am so sorry that you never knew her."

"So am I. If it's any consolation to you, she loved you. And when you proposed, which she was hoping you would, she would have said yes."

He slid his hands from beneath Farragut's and crossed the room. Returning the keys to the officer, he patted the man's shoulder and softly said, "Keep an eye on him."

"I will, detective. And thanks for the coffee."

Goren nodded and looked back toward the cell. The only sound in the room was the sobbing coming from the cell as Dan Farragut cried out his grief.

Goren turned away, tucked his hands into his pockets and left.


	18. Never the Right Time

Goren quietly let himself into his still-dark apartment. Logan remained snoring on the couch, and Eames had to still be in bed. He went into the kitchen and took a tumbler from the cupboard. After filling it with scotch, he sat in his recliner in the living room. His mind revisited his discussion with Dan Farragut as he drank, taking him to a very dark place.

* * *

><p>The rising sun began to brighten the room, rousing Eames from her sleep. She rolled over, reaching out toward Goren, intending to snuggle for awhile before they got up to face the day, but his side of the bed was empty.<p>

Rising, she stopped in the bathroom before continuing to the living room. He was sleeping in the recliner, his empty glass on the floor beside an almost empty bottle she knew had been at least half full the night before. "Oh, Bobby," she said softly as she approached the chair.

She ran her hand over his hair, but he didn't move. She felt a talk brewing that she really did not want to have with him about his tendency to choose negative, self-destructive means of coping when more positive ones were available to him. When plagued with dark thoughts, he always sought alcohol for company, a choice that she felt kept him in that dark place, making it even darker. It was going to require a major overhaul of his thought processes and his decision making to get him to seek the light rather than the dark when life became overwhelming for him, but she loved him enough to initiate and help him make those changes.

She took his glass and the bottle into the kitchen and set the coffee pot to brew. As the aroma of brewing coffee filled the apartment, Logan began to stir on the couch. She looked toward the doorway when he appeared there. "Good morning," she said.

"Yeah, okay. Did he sleep in the chair last night?"

"Only for part of it." She nodded at the empty bottle on the counter. "I guess he couldn't sleep."

"How was he when you went to bed?"

"I don't know. He still hides from me. I think he's reluctant to upset me with the thoughts that run through his head. I'm still trying to get through to him. It's a work in progress."

"I give you a hell of a lot of credit for even trying," he said as he accepted a cup of coffee from her. "Most people wouldn't bother."

"What about you? You try."

"That's different. Bobby and I have a kind of bond that most people never form. We were abused as kids, and that kind of experience sets you apart from normal folks. You form a bond with someone who knows what you lived through and understands the circumstances that made you who you are, or you develop this rage against the world and isolate yourself from it. How do you think I ended up on Staten Island for ten years? I grew up really angry and that's hard to get past. Over the past few years, though, since Bobby and I became friends, I've calmed down a lot. That was something Lennie could never do, get me to calm down."

"Your anger and his are different."

"Not really. We just handle it differently. He's naturally a much calmer person than I am. The anger builds in him and simmers. I don't hold it in. I was kind of a wild kid. He's always been much more in his head." He opened the pantry and took out a granola bar. As he opened it, he said, "My mother was an alcoholic, and I could blame her for what she did to me, for the choices she made. Bobby never had that luxury, at least not since he was little, before he realized why his mom was the way she was. She was sick, and he had no one to blame for that, no one to be angry with, because it really wasn't anyone's fault. So he focused everything inside, because that's what he does."

"Sometimes he goes so far inside I'm afraid he won't come back."

"Don't worry about that, sweetheart. He'll always come back."

"How can you be so sure?"

He washed down the granola bar with coffee. "Because I've seen the way he looks at you, Alex. He's very much in love with you. He'll always come back. You captured his heart long ago. Now that he has yours, and he knows it, he's not going to let you go unless you choose to walk away."

She seemed to deflate. "I could never do that, Mike."

"Because it would destroy him?"

She shook her head. "No. Because it would destroy me. Do you think I hopped into bed with him on a whim? If that were the case I would have done it years ago." She turned away from him to fix her own coffee. "I have been in love with him for years. I can't pinpoint the moment it happened. Sometimes it seems like it was always there. I fought it tooth and nail because he's my partner. For all his physical power and resourcefulness, there is still a fragile vulnerability to him that I didn't want to exploit. There was always a wall between us that kept us apart, that protected us from each other, and it only had a single one-way door. I knew that if I ever stepped through that door—and it had to be me because I knew he never would—I knew it was going to be for good. There would be no going back. So I had to make damn sure I knew exactly what I was doing. I had to think with my head, to look at the situation from every conceivable angle, before I could follow my heart. So this was not a decision I made lightly. I love him, Mike, and when I got into bed with him, I knew it had to be for keeps."

Logan smiled at her. "You're a smart woman, Alex Eames."

Her face flushed and she changed the subject. "What do you want for breakfast?"

"I get breakfast, too? I'll have to spend the weekend on the couch more often."

"Don't do us any favors. How about pancakes?"

"What did I do to deserve that?"

"Nothing. I want pancakes and I am simply including you, so don't push your luck."

"How about some help? Would that increase my worthiness?"

"Possibly. Get down the flour."

* * *

><p>Goren stirred, slowly rising through an alcohol haze toward consciousness. He rubbed his eyes and stretched without opening them. Despite his condition, he felt her presence before she pushed her fingers through his hair. Sliding his arm around her waist, he tipped his head toward her and rested it against her abdomen.<p>

When he finally forced his eyes open, he pulled away. He had to answer the call of nature that had woken him in the first place. She helped him up, a supporting hand on his back when he faltered. He didn't say anything. He simply leaned over to kiss her, accepting her support when he lost his balance.

She watched him until he disappeared down the hall. Logan looked sympathetic. "I've been there more times than I can count."

"So have I."

"Grief will do that."

She looked at him. "When was the last time you felt grief?"

"When Lennie died. Your last foray into grief was when your husband died, right?"

She shook her head. "No, it was more recent than that."

"His mom?"

"No, not really. It was when I gave up my nephew after he was born. I went home afterwards empty-handed to a very lonely house. I hadn't been alone for nine months and I felt every second of it. I could feel the absence of every beat of his heart. Bobby came by that night with a bottle of vodka, a gallon of orange juice and a mountain of understanding I never expected from him." She bit her lower lip. "He only drank enough to relax. After that point, he just babysat."

From the doorway Goren watched them. "It was a little more than that."

She turned to look at him. "What does that mean?"

"Did you ever wonder why I only called after that?"

"No. You were busy with cases, and I think your mom was sick, wasn't she?"

He nodded, a mistake that sent the room veering off sharply to the right and his stomach lurching off to the left. Logan appeared at his side. "You look green. Sit down."

With Logan guiding him, he made it to the chair. Leaning back in it, he closed his eyes so that the spinning wouldn't make him sick. Once the planet resumed its stable orbit, he forced his eyes open, trying to focus on Logan. "Are you going into the squad room today?"

"I wasn't planning on it. And I like the way you did that, sidestepping any further explanation."

"He's a master at deflection," Eames said.

Goren waved his hand impatiently. He wasn't in the best of moods. "You should go in. Dan Farragut has a statement to make."

"We already have his statement and it consists of one word, which coincidentally happens to be the only word he has spoken."

"I went in to talk to him last night."

"You did what?"

"I wanted to ask him about Sammy."

It did not escape Eames' notice that he finally said her name. She reached out and gently teased the curls that were beginning to frame his ear. His eyes began to close.

"What did he tell you?" Logan insisted.

He forced his eyes open. "He told me what happened. If he tries to deny it, you have it on video. Just pull the tapes from midnight on."

"I'd better get going," Logan muttered as he fetched his shoes from under the coffee table.

"What happened to her?" Eames asked.

"His brother accidentally drowned her."

"The disabled one?"

"Yes. His brain was deprived of oxygen when he was born. Now he has the mental capacity of a four-year-old. He didn't mean to hurt her; he doesn't know his own strength."

"So how'd she end up in the mayor's backyard?" Logan asked as he began searching for his tie.

"Farragut was afraid for his brother so he called a buddy with shady connections and they took care of the dump."

"But Gracie Mansion? That's not a choice I would make if I were dumping a body," Eames said.

"It makes sense if you think about it," Goren said. "There was no doubt she'd be found quickly."

Logan nodded as he tied the tie he'd found under the couch. "It also explains the crime scene. She wasn't just pushed out of a car. She was placed there, by the path, on her back, like she was sleeping. They took care with her, which was very risky considering the high profile of the area." He grabbed his jacket. "I'm outta here. Thanks, Bobby. I'll call you later." He waved at Eames. "Thanks for the pancakes."

Once he was gone, Eames asked, "Are you hungry?"

"No. I think I'll just go lay down."

"Want some company?"

"Sure, unless you have something better to do."

"What's better than laying in bed with you?"

She helped him up again and he muttered, "Not getting puked on would be a consideration."

"I think you value your life enough not to do that."

"Maybe."

Once he had crawled into bed, she got in beside him and snuggled into his arms. She felt him relax, and he made a soft noise that seemed to be half-sigh and half-moan. She reached up and placed a kiss in front of his ear. "So what did you do that night that made you afraid to come back?"

"Not afraid. Reluctant. And what makes you think it was something I did?"

"What am I not remembering?"

"You were so upset," he said softly as he kissed her hair. "You told me how empty you felt, and I just wanted to help you feel better. You had a lot to drink, and I knew I should have gone home. But you kind of got in my lap, and you started..."

He trailed off, but she knew from the reaction of his body to the memory that she did more than just offer a full-body hug. "Oh, God..." she groaned.

"Yeah, you said a lot of that. But...I...I couldn't take advantage of you, Alex, as much as I desperately wanted to. I managed to put you off until you finally passed out. I tucked you in to your bed, and I left."

"You didn't think that was something we needed to talk about?"

"Absolutely not. As long as you didn't remember it, I could try to pretend it never happened."

"So what did you do?"

"Nothing I'm proud of."

"Bobby..."

He shrugged. "I went to the bar near my place and picked up a woman, used her as a substitute for the woman I really wanted. I've done a lot of that over the years."

"You didn't have to go."

"Yes, I did. If I hadn't, I would never have been able to look you in the eye again, and it would have created a tension between us that I would have put there. I didn't want that. Looking back, I still think it was the right decision."

She lay beside him in silence, listening to him breathe. She knew when he drifted back to sleep, and she rested her head on his chest. Beneath her head, his heart beat steadily, an impossibly good heart driving the actions of a mostly honorable man. The steady thrum lulled her back to sleep.

* * *

><p>Logan came back for dinner. After a cursory knock, he opened the door and poked his head in. "Everybody decent?"<p>

Goren was stretched out on the couch, right arm tucked under his head, left hand holding one of Sammy's journals. Eames was in the kitchen, making noise with pots and pans. "Everyone but you," she called out.

With a laugh, he came into the house. "How are you feeling?" he asked as he sat in the recliner.

"I'm fine," Goren answered.

"That's a relative claim."

"I guess."

Logan's eyes darted to the cushion under Goren's legs, and he thought about an old Poe short story he'd read in high school, _The Tell-Tale Heart_. He could almost hear Sammy's scrapbook talking to him, begging him to set it free. He pushed the thought aside. "I talked with Kent, which was very unpleasant. Seems she doesn't appreciate being bothered on Sunday. She's going to arraign Farragut in the morning on a charge of accessory after the fact. It's gonna be up to a judge if he does time. He's elected not to go to trial."

"What about Charlie?"

"Dan wants to go with us to pick him up. He begged me, said he wouldn't disclose his location unless he could go along. He's kind of naïve about due process."

"He's never had any dealings with the law before. He's kind of naïve in general, and too trusting. It never occurred to him that a 200 pound child might hurt someone."

"I don't know if I feel sorry for him or not."

Goren sat up and set the journal on the coffee table. "Did you take her last journal with you to place into evidence?"

"No. I forgot. But we won't need it now since he's not going to trial."

"Where did you put it?"

Eames mercifully chose that moment to come into the room from the kitchen. "The chicken is in the oven," she said.

Logan twisted in the chair, giving her a meaningful look. "What?" she said.

"I think the right time is here whether we want it to be or not."

"The right time for what?" Goren asked.

Eames looked from Logan to Goren and back. They had not decided on the best way to tell him and now they were going to have to wing it.

She walked over and sat on the coffee table in front of him, placing her hands lightly above each of his knees. "Last night, when you were packing up Sammy's things in her room, we found something in one of the bookcases in the living room. We just didn't know how to tell you about it."

"Just telling me usually works best."

Quietly, Logan said, "Sammy knew, Bobby."

"Knew what?"

Eames tightened her grip. "She knew about you, that you were her brother."

"What? No. How could she..."

"She did what adopted kids do," Logan said. "She went looking for answers."

Eames nodded. "She went looking for her birth family, and that led her to you."

Goren's face was a mask of apprehension and confusion. "How do you know?"

She twisted at the waist to look at Logan, who pointed at the couch. "Under the cushions on that side."

Goren flipped up the cushion and retrieved the journal and the scrapbook. Handing the journal to Eames, he opened the scrapbook and began to look through it. Each newspaper article had his name highlighted in yellow. Aside from the roasting he took at the hands of the press over Dan Croyden, there was little of substance to find about him in the media. All of the articles were about cases he worked, many with Eames, some from before they were partners. His mother's obituary was there as well. Then came the pictures.

"Uhm, in her bedroom, behind the books, I found a large envelope. I didn't take the time to look through it. I just figured it was something along the lines of what she kept hidden."

"Like Penthouse or Playgirl?" Logan suggested.

"Yeah, something like that."

"Where did you put the box?" Eames asked.

"It's on the floor in my closet, on the boxes of journals. The envelope is laying flat in the bottom of the box, under the rest of the stuff."

She went to the bedroom to get the envelope. Goren's lack of any reaction but surprise had Logan worried. "Do you understand why we didn't show this to you right away?"

"No, not really."

"We wanted to choose a time when you weren't reeling from everything else. We were trying not to tip the scales over."

Goren didn't answer. Eames came back and handed him the envelope, returning to her seat on the coffee table. He opened it and slid out a stack of papers. He sifted through them. Most of them were pictures, copies of which were in her scrapbook. There were also documents and, on top of the stack, a letter, dated December 17, 2004, on letterhead belonging to Shoemacher Private Investigative Services.

_Dear Miss Fullerton,_

_I have concluded my investigation. As requested, I located your birth family. Your father, Dr. Mitchell Rutherford, has passed away. Dr. Rutherford was a psychiatrist and is survived by his widow, Eunice, your step mother. I have included her address and phone number, should you wish to contact her. Your birth mother, Frances Goren, was a librarian who suffers from schizophrenia and lives at the Carmel Ridge Psychiatric Facility. Contact information for her is also included, should you wish to use it. _

_Dr. and Mrs. Rutherford have no other children, but Mrs. Goren is also the mother of two sons, Frank and Robert. Regrettably, I was unable to find much information about the older brother, Frank, and I was unable to locate him. However, I did locate the younger brother, Robert. He is a police detective with NYPD's Major Case Squad, living in Brooklyn. I have enclosed what information I could find about him as well as a number of surveillance photos I took for you, ordered by the dates they were taken, which are on the back of each photo. The blond woman in the pictures with him is his partner, Alexandra Eames. The red-headed woman in two of the earlier pictures I took is Detective Lynn Bishop, your brother's interim partner while Detective Eames was on maternity leave. I was able to ascertain that Detective Eames is unmarried, but I could not find out who the father of her child is. Perhaps you have a nephew, but that is far from certain. I found no evidence that Robert is involved with her or anyone else. By necessity anything beyond a working relationship with Detective Eames would be something they would keep well hidden. The man with him in the most recent photographs is Michael Logan, a detective from Staten Island. Judging by my observations of their interactions, they are friends. I hope the enclosed results of my investigation meet with your expectations._

_Enclosed also find a check in the amount of $2500.00, a graduation gift from my wife and me. The few times I met with you, you left an impression on me. Many of the people who come to me seeking their birth families do so with mixed emotions, often with feelings of guilt, rejection or abandonment. In you, I see a well-adjusted, happy young woman who seeks only to expand her circle of loved ones. I wish only the best for you and Mr. Farragut. Please do not hesitate to call upon me if I may be of further assistance._

_Sincerely,_

_Garrett P. Shoemacher_

He read the letter twice before handing it over to Eames, who read it and passed it to Logan. "2004?" Logan muttered as he handed the letter back to Goren. "It's been three years. Why didn't she ever make contact?"

"It's a delicate situation, made complicated by certain circumstances," Goren said. "If what Farragut said about her was true, she would have researched schizophrenia, so she would have known that approaching my mother would have unpredictable results. Most likely, it would have agitated her into an episode, which is never a good thing."

Eames had been looking through Sammy's last journal. Softly, she read, "_August 31, 2007. I still feel guilty for not approaching my brother at our mother's funeral two weeks ago, but he looked so distraught, so miserable, so very sad. It wasn't the right time, not then. I hope enough time has passed so when I approach him, I won't cause him more grief. I want this to be a happy time for him, for both of us. I am so excited, but I'm afraid, too, about how he will react. He might not want to be bothered with me. I'm also worried about how I will react to him. After all, the only way I know him is through the pictures Mr. S. took. My vivid imagination has created a vision of him that he might not fit at all. Dan says I have too much imagination, and maybe he's right, but I have never seen that as a handicap before. Well, even if Robert doesn't fit with the image I have created of him, I'm sure I will love him. After all, he's my brother, and I already love him, well, the part of him that is my brother, any way. When I think about him, I think about one of the photos Mr. S. took, one of my favorites. It's the one of him with his partner. I'm not sure where he took it, since he didn't label the location and there are no visible landmarks, but it's outside somewhere in the city. Her attention is focused somewhere off camera, and he's looking at her. The look on his face is just so tender and so full of love. That's the picture around which I have created my own image of him—a tender, loving man. I get butterflies in my stomach just thinking about approaching him. I want so much to meet him, to get to know him. I am going to give myself a deadline. Christmas. I am going to approach him by Christmas or I will be the poorest excuse __of a sister that ever lived._"

Logan broke the extended silence that followed. "God, that was only six weeks ago..."

Eames motioned at him to stop talking, her eyes glued to her partner, trying to get some kind of read off him. He was silent, staring at the open scrapbook in his lap. She leaned forward to look at his face. "Bobby?"

Slowly, he raised his eyes to meet hers. The stark grief she saw there crushed her. "We shouldn't have told you."

He shook his head slowly. "No, you did the right thing. I would have found out when I read her journals. It was...better that I found out from you."

He closed the scrapbook and set it on the table beside her, suddenly feeling claustrophobic. The walls were closing in on him and he felt a rising panic he wasn't sure he could handle. Rising to his feet, he walked to the door, each step more hurried than the last. He left the apartment without saying another word.


	19. A Step in the Right Direction

Eames stopped at the sidewalk and looked up and down the street. She let slip a huge sigh of relief when she saw him halfway down the block, leaning against a lamppost with a cigarette. She walked down the street toward him, stopping a few feet away. "Bobby?" she called softly.

He didn't react immediately, and she waited. He finished the cigarette and flicked the butt into the street. Then he held his arm out toward her, an open invitation she gladly accepted. He folded his arm around her and pressed a kiss to her head. She hugged him. "Are you sure we did the right thing, Bobby?"

"Telling me about her scrapbook? Yes. Should you have told me yesterday when you found it? Maybe, maybe not. That was a judgment call, and I trust your judgment."

"So you're not upset?"

"With you and Mike? No. I know you acted out of concern, and I appreciate that. It's not often someone acts out of concern for me." He paused for a moment. "Practically never, actually."

"So why did you rush out of the house?"

"I...I needed air. The walls were closing in on me, and I...I had to get out of there, before I went into a full blown panic."

She gave him a firm squeeze. "Is there anything I can do?"

"You're doing it now." He released a heavy sigh. "I know I've been...difficult lately, and I'm sorry. I just...I don't know how to handle all of this. That and it's come so close after my mother died. It's...It's almost too much."

"I think you're handling it pretty well, considering."

He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, but she took it from his hand and gently tucked it back into his pocket. "You have better ways of coping with your emotions."

"I do?"

"Yes, you do."

He looked down at her, allowing himself to become distracted by the glow of her hair under the streetlight. His thoughts continued to ramble through his head, and one train of thought eventually found its way to his mouth. "Losing my mother was difficult, but it wasn't tragic, you know? She had cancer, and she was almost 70 years old. We're supposed to bury our parents. That doesn't make it easy, but it's the way things are supposed to be. There were circumstances surrounding her death that made it more difficult, but still...I was adjusting. But how do you deal with burying someone too soon? I mean, Sammy was only 25, and I lost her before I ever knew her. And Joe...you should never have had to bury Joe. How...How do you put it behind you and move on with your life?"

"If you had asked me that two weeks ago, I would have told you that I'd let you know when I found a way. Tonight, though, I have a different answer."

He leaned to the side a little and looked at her, confused. "I don't understand."

She placed her hands on either side of his face and softly kissed him. He closed his eyes and rested his hands on her waist, pulling her close. Slowly breaking the kiss, she stepped back half a step, so she could see his face. "Eventually, we find a way to move on. You know that I've dated over the past nine years, since I lost him, but none of them were substantial. I was just as lost as I was when Joe died. Then, I found a relationship I could invest my heart in. I found someone who pushed me over the threshold and let me finally allow Joe to rest in peace. I could finally move on, and it's significant for me, not to have the weight of grief holding me prisoner. But it took a long time and the right man to let me do that."

"You mean...me?"

His tone was one of total disbelief, that he could ever have such a significant impact on anyone's life. But in his eyes, she saw the glimmer of hope—a hope that he was indeed the one who freed her from her grief.

"Yes, Bobby," she said with tenderness. "You."

He pushed her hair back off her face and lightly stroked her cheek. "I'm a wreck," he admitted. "I haven't been right for about a year now, if I was ever right to begin with, and it's been worse the past two weeks. But...you..." He paused and drew in a deep breath, struggling to contain the emotions that threatened to overwhelm him. He tipped his head to the left, locking eyes with her. "Alex, you are the reason I get out of bed every morning. Maybe the job gives my life meaning, but you, you are the driving force behind everything. You are my will to live, to keep going when I just want to throw in the towel. Without you, I'm nothing."

In his face she saw an openness, a vulnerability that she had never seen before. He was laying it all on the line. If life were a poker game, he was just declaring himself all in. He was placing his heart—his fragile, fractured heart, wrapped in a soul that was equally damaged—in her hands for safekeeping. Always, he had held back part of himself, the part that was most damaged, most vulnerable. He was now offering that to her of his own free will, and it was a gift that she would treasure more than any other. Nothing carried by any store was more precious in her eyes. As much as it was against her own nature to open herself to another human, it was even moreso for him. That he was doing so now was more a profession of his love, and his hard-won trust, than any words he could possibly say, and she found it surprisingly easy to respond in kind, to return his gift of himself with an offering in kind.

She caressed his cheek and softly said, "When I lost Joe, I became an incomplete person. When I stepped into your arms and kissed you for the first time, I became whole once again. Every part of me that was weak and fragile found strength and completeness in you."

He pulled her into his arms and held her as though she would drift off into space if he let go. Returning his embrace, she reveled in his warmth and strength and love.

With great reluctance, she stepped back from his arms. "We'd better go back inside. My chicken is going to burn."

"Mike's in there."

"You think it will occur to him to pull it out before he smells it burning?"

"Maybe you have a point," he conceded. "You go ahead. I'm not quite ready to go back inside yet."

"Are you sure you're okay?"

He nodded slowly. "Yeah. I'm okay."

Leaning up, she kissed him before she stepped away and walked back to the house. He watched her go, suffused by a warmth that was alien to him. Every sense registered her presence as she retreated—her heels clicking on the pavement, her hips swaying as she walked, her scent lingering in his nose, the taste and feel of her imprinted forever in his mind. Once she was inside, he retrieved the cigarette pack from his pocket, shook one out and lit it.

* * *

><p>Eames was just pulling the chicken from the oven when Goren came back into the house. Logan had moved to the recliner, so he sat on the couch. "Are you okay?" Logan asked.<p>

"I will be," Goren promised. "Thanks to you and Eames."

"What happened?"

He shrugged. "The walls started to close in on me. I needed to get some air."

Logan was quiet for a moment. "Did your mom ever realize what she did? You know, acknowledge any wrong-doing?"

"Did yours?"

"Sure she did. Every time she sobered up. Of course, that never stopped her from doing it again the next time."

Over time, as their friendship grew stronger, each time Logan asked a personal question, he answered Goren's inevitable challenge with a willingness to offer the same information from his own life. That willingness to share, to bond, made it easier for Goren to open up to him. "Mine never did. Half the time she was protecting me from some threat that existed only in her mind. The other half, I became the threat. The closest she ever came to admitting she was wrong was telling me that she did the best she could. But nothing was ever her fault. Her disease made it impossible for her to own her behavior."

"I can't imagine what that was like. I mean, my childhood was hard, but it was predictable. She always followed the same basic pattern, so I knew what was coming. To never know what was coming or when...talk about sleeping with your eyes open."

Goren waved a hand, dismissing Logan's comment. "I survived."

"You did more than survive."

He didn't respond, and Logan knew the conversation was over. Gracefully, he let the matter drop.

"Dinner's ready, guys," Eames called from the kitchen.

Logan got to his feet. "Smells great."

Goren stayed where he was for a few minutes before he joined them. "I have to go to Connecticut tomorrow."

"Why?" Logan asked.

"I have to get that gym bag from Ross and deliver it to the Fullertons. I also have to let them know what happened to Sammy...as soon as I figure out what to tell them."

Eames chewed her lower lip. "That's a tough one. They have the right to know what happened but knowing it was Charlie...that's going to be hard for them."

Logan waved his fork in the air. "Why don't you bring Dan with you? Let him own up to his actions. Make him tell the Fullertons what happened to their daughter. We can have him processed and streeted by noon. When you get back, call me and we'll meet up to take Charlie into custody. Then I'll take the hit and spring for dinner."

Eames nodded. "That's an excellent idea. Dan needs to take responsibility for his role in what happened."

She felt a great weight lift from her and she wanted to kiss Logan. Ever since Goren told them what had happened to his sister, about Dan's involvement in her death, she'd been sick with dread about the entire situation, especially knowing that Goren would take it upon himself to tell his sister's parents what had happened to her. In some extended kind of way, they were family, and he would never put it on Logan or anyone else to take that responsibility. They should hear it from someone to whom it mattered in a direct way.

Goren didn't address Logan's suggestion. He continued to eat, not because he was hungry, but because he didn't know what else to do and he needed to keep his hands busy. Eames and Logan watched him, waiting for his input. Finally, he laid his knife and fork down. After another few moments, he looked up, meeting Logan's eyes and then Eames'. Slowly, he nodded. "All right. We'll put it on Dan."

He got up from the table and opened the cabinet above the sink. Eames felt her heart sink. He was faltering. "Bobby..." she began.

He didn't answer as he poured himself a drink and set the bottle back in its place. Turning, glass in hand, he leaned back against the sink and looked at her. As open and vulnerable as he'd been outside, he was now locked tight behind a wall she had faced too many times. He was retreating and she wasn't sure why.

Logan sensed something was up, something in which he had no part. He finished his plate and stood. "I'm gonna get going. I'll see you two in the morning."

"Thanks, Mike," Eames said.

He set his plate in the sink and squeezed Goren's arm. "It'll be okay, buddy. You're not alone in this. Remember that."

Goren closed his eyes and nodded. With a final look of sympathy and encouragement at Eames, Logan said, "Call me if you need me."

He left the room. Thirty seconds later, the front door closed. Eames rose and walked to Goren. When she wrapped her fingers around his glass, he released it to her. "We have to talk," she said, every fiber of her being apprehensive.

She set the glass on the counter and took his hand, leading him to the couch. She had considered having this discussion in bed before they went to sleep, since he was most open with her after sex, but she discarded that as a bad idea. The chance of this conversation taking a bad turn was very high, no matter how carefully she handled him.

She sat beside him and twisted her body to face him. "What happened? Why did you shut down during dinner?"

"I didn't do it intentionally."

"Do you know what caused it?"

He shifted where he sat and bounced his leg, unsettled and uncomfortable with the conversation. "I don't know how I feel about approaching the Fullertons with Dan."

"Tell me what you think, then."

He paused, and his agitation increased. She waited, trying to keep her expression open and encouraging. "He was going to be their son-in-law. He shares in their loss. They love him as an extension of Sammy. He may not have had a direct hand in her death, but he was indirectly responsible."

"So what's the problem?"

"This will impact their memories of him and of her. I'm not sure how willing I am to take that away from them."

Reaching out, she touched his hand. When he didn't withdraw, she closed her hand around his. "There's nothing more you can do. He has to accept the consequences of his actions, and they have to deal with reality. You can't protect them any further. What's done is done."

"That doesn't mean I have to like it."

"No, but you have to accept it for what it is."

He stared at the coffee table as he digested what she said. She shifted closer to him. "I know how unsettled you get when things go beyond your control. I understand that you want to deaden the pain, to escape emotions you have trouble dealing with. But there are better ways to cope than by drowning yourself in a bottle of scotch. You're not alone any more, Bobby. You have me, and I am willing to help you when you feel overwhelmed."

He didn't reply, but he'd gone very still. She had no idea what to make of that. She reached out and stroked his hair, uncertain.

He stayed still for what seemed a very long time, and then he moved all at once. His arm slid behind her as he turned toward her, pulling her to him. His mouth crashed into hers and he kissed her hard, holding her firmly against him.

Surprised at first, she tensed. Quickly, she brought herself under control, relaxing against him as she slid her arms around him, tight and secure. She kissed him back, fueling whatever it was that drove him.

Gradually, he became more gentle, burying his hands in her hair as he released his hold on her. She had the opportunity to withdraw, but she did not take it. She remained entangled with him, mouths, tongues, limbs, bodies pressed close of their own accord.

He pushed her onto her back on the couch, pinning her there with his body, and she forced herself to stay calm, not to fight against him, which went against her instincts. In an ultimate display of trust, she opened herself to whatever he chose to do to her, without resistance.

Eventually, he regained his control and pulled back from her, searching her face with moist eyes. She reached up and rested her hand on his cheek. He leaned into her touch, an expression of mixed embarrassment and regret on his face. "I...I didn't hurt you, did I?"

She shook her head. "No."

He pushed himself off her and got up. Turning away from her, he clamped his hand to the back of his neck, clearly distressed.

She got up and ducked around to face him, placing both palms flat against his chest. With gentle pressure, she pushed him backwards. He brought his hands to her shoulders and when she shoved him back onto the couch, he pulled her along and she landed on top of him. His eyes didn't leave her face until he leaned forward to kiss her, a soft, loving kiss. He rested his forehead against hers. "You really do know what you're getting into, don't you?"

"Of course I do."

"And you're still...willing...to subject yourself to...to me."

"I wouldn't put it exactly in those words, but yes."

"And when I piss you off?"

"Then I'll get mad, and then I'll get over it and we'll move on." She pulled back far enough to see his face, to read the fear in his eyes. "I'm not going to leave you. I can't promise I won't ever get mad at you because I know I will. But as long as we're open with each other and committed to each other, we can survive anything."

He rubbed his hands up and down her back. "At the end of each day," he promised. "I will never go to sleep without telling you I love you."

She felt warmed to the core by the glow in his eyes. "And when you feel overwhelmed?"

"I can't promise I won't ever seek to escape, and I won't promise to stop drinking, but I will promise that when I need solace or comfort, when I need to find peace, I will come to you."

It was a start. She slid her arms around his neck and hugged him. Rising, she took his hand and led him to the bedroom. His drink went untouched, at least for the night. After loving her, he held her close and whispered "I love you" in her ear. He slept well all night, undisturbed by his demons, at least for one night. In her arms, he found the love and peace he had been seeking all his life. She was his one chance for happiness and he didn't want to let her go.


End file.
